HotelChatter asks the question of whether or not you'd want to stay on a women-only floor (for the women among us, of course. Sorry guys.). It's riffing off this Vancouver Sun article about how more hotels are catering to women, and how they're doing it.
I don't think I'd care too much one way or another about the single-gender floor, though I might feel a bit safer if I had to walk the halls late at night. It could be a bit tricky though. The article says that Canada has privacy laws that prohibit the hotel from asking a guest's gender when s/he makes the reservation, so you might have to guess (apologies in advance to all named Kim, Chris, and other non-denominational monikers). Or maybe you have to request the women's-only floor? Then you get into transgender issues, etc. I wouldn't go there unless I had some solid research pointing me toward it.
But more generally, do men and women really want different things from their hotel experience? As the article quotes Penelope Trunk, CEO of the Brazen Careerist, a social network site for Gen Y professionals: "Men want their room to be a something where they dump their stuff; they go out drinking, they come back and watch porn," says Trunk. "The women want it to be a spa."
Hmm, not much of a spa-lady here, and I don't want to buy into the drinking/porn male stereotype. But I do agree with the article's contention that women eat room service more (note to chefs: please have more than one veggie entree option for we veg-heads who end up eating in more than one night), use the treadmills more than the weight machines, and care more deeply about bathroom lighting and amenities than most guys do. But generally, all I care about is that it's safe, clean, has lights I can figure out how to turn on, a coffee pot with coffee for the morning, great service, and a comfy bed. The rest is just fluff -- nice fluff, for sure, but still fluff.
What do you think?