Four Points By Sheraton Bedford Manchester Airport

“GREAT HOTEL WITH AMAZING AMENITIES”

Date of stay: Saturday, June 29th, 2024. We were given rooms 215 & 221. 2 very different rooms. 221 is a charming & regular room, while 215 is an extensive, spacious, roomy Suite.  The hotel check-in person was very friendly and cheerful. We had a great conversation. The hotel is very bright, cl… more

Date of stay: Saturday, June 29th, 2024. We were given rooms 215 & 221. 2 very different rooms. 221 is a charming & regular room, while 215 is an extensive, spacious, roomy Suite.  The hotel check-in person was very friendly and cheerful. We had a great conversation. The hotel is very bright, clean, and appealing.  Our room was very large, with a living room containing a couch/ Television/chairs/ dining table/ desk, and kitchenette.  The bathroom is huge (2 doors) and immaculate & bright. The shower head is a little low - which could be a challenge for tall people. The large sink and counter offer plenty of room to put stuff down.  The bed is very comforfotable & clean. (Zero sign of pests). The mattress was firm but provided a good night's sleep.  There were 4 pillows on the king-sized bed, which were a little thin for my liking, but otherwise very good.   We just asked for two extra pillows, and it was perfect.  The breakfast is complimentary, consisting of scrambled eggs, sausage links, breads, coffee/tea/juice, waffles, cold cereals, etc  The hotel.is pet friendly as we saw many dogs - be sure to check their policies when booking.  Free onsite parking is available.  There is a nice pool in the hotel, which is open until 10pm. The fitness centre is 24 hours.  There is even a games room with arcade games like ms pac-man etc.  The hotel is very close to Target & shopping.  Overall, this is a fantastic place to stay.  We enjoyed it very much.  This was only our second time ever staying at a country inn and suites, and both times were amazing.

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“I have a theory about the Country Inn & Suites Chain...Stuck In Time”

So my theory about the entire chain is based on 3 different hotel stays across the country, small sample size, but I see what has happened here. Radisson went on a building spree in the 90s and 00s. Perhaps overbuilt...Radisson looked at all of their hotels and all brands and probably around 2018/2… more

So my theory about the entire chain is based on 3 different hotel stays across the country, small sample size, but I see what has happened here. Radisson went on a building spree in the 90s and 00s. Perhaps overbuilt...Radisson looked at all of their hotels and all brands and probably around 2018/2019 said: well we need to update all of these that haven't had updates in 10-20 years. This hotel was built in 2008. Anyway, they found a taker in what I'll call an economical brand in Choice who had really cheap hotels. Choice saw this as a great opportunity to get more "upscale brands" from Radisson. I think Choice didn't do their due diligence and decided to go ahead with the purchase in 2022 even though the entire Radisson chain needed major room and facility renovations (or they just didn't care). And Choice decided to postpone major revisions because they probably spent too much on purchasing the chain.... So back to this facility. I was greeted by Jeremy when I first arrived. And he left a great first impression. The rest of the staff were very good. So staff were good. Now the facility itself! I swear the room and facility felt like I was in the "aughts" (00s). Everything about the room says: we've done absolutely nothing with the room since we built it: same worn and dated furniture, 90s lamps, worn desks, televisions from the 00's (!), carpeting, bath/shower with curtains, etc. It was almost surreal how 00's it felt. The "A Warm Welcome" card in the room outlining the services directory at the site is from the Radisson affiliation days (2+ years ago) with various phone numbers hand written all over the card, food stains, and how to join Radisson's rewards program which doesn't exist anymore.... The rooms are cleaned as best as a 16-17 year old room with no updates can be. Instead of the vinyl floors in the rooms, it's old school 16-17 year old carpet that had a plethora of gum or tar marks all over the carpet. So just walk around with flip flops or slippers I guess, but that stuff ain't coming off the floor anyway! I might respect this retro feel but they took out the hot tub and more importantly the retro game room....Old school video games based on the old pictures, took it down this summer, I was looking forward to playing some games. Anyway, you can see where they tiled over the hot tub. Piecemeal approach to updates are apparent. The game room is making way for an expanded fitness center which was decent. The hallways ditched the carpets for the vinyl flooring that is everywhere now in hotels....so slow progress, it just would be nice if they focused on the rooms first. Breakfast was pretty good, better than a lot of the chain free breakfasts I see out there. But that's not saying much, i usually skip chain free breakfasts. The outside music is left on all night, so for those of us near the front entrance have to deal with that noise all night long, so bring your earplugs. Also if you don't have a pet, choose a room on second or third floors to avoid the plethora of pets that come to the hotel. Like I said, it's a tired hotel. If I had to chose between this and a Fairfield or Courtyard, I'd chose those. If I'm choosing within the Choice Hotels universe between this hotel and a Quality Inn or a Comfort Inn, come here.....Since the price was similar to a close by Quality Inn, I chose this, but to save $40-50 a night vs. the local courtyard, I chose to stay here (as did a number of utility guys, truck drivers, and so forth).

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