Hilton boss Chris Nassetta just revealed the No. 1 complaint at hotels. It’s not what you think

Here’s an important message for hospitality companies everywhere: Never hang your guests out to dry.

According to Chris Nassetta, president and CEO of Hilton, the No. 1 complaint among hotel guests these days isn’t lackluster breakfast buffets, noisy neighbors, or even dirty rooms.

“It’s towels!” he said at the Fast Company Innovation Festival in New York this week. “It’s the quantity, how thick they are, all that.”

Nassetta made the revelation as a segue into the hotel giant’s renewed focus on “back-to-basics hospitality,” the idea that a hotel can have all the fancy amenities and app-enabled bells and whistles in the world, but guests will still check out disappointed if their basic needs aren’t met.

And in a post-pandemic world where revenge travel is the new normal, the little things matter more than ever, he adds. “The really important big trend is the same old, same old, which is people—what you guys want,” Nassetta said “You want it done maniacally well, consistently, with high quality, and in a friendly way.”

With travel and tourism recovering from their COVID-era doldrums, Hilton has seen significant recent growth. The company reported a 42.5% increase in revenue per available room last year, compared to the same period in 2021.

To meet demand, it also opened 355 new hotels—totaling more than 58,000 rooms—including the ultra-swanky Waldorf Astoria Cancun. And earlier this year, it announced Spark by Hilton, a “premium economy” brand aimed discerning travelers on a budget.

What exactly is premium economy? “It’s ‘economy,’ but it’s at the very high end of economy,” Nassetta explained. “I think it’s the most disruptive thing that we’ve done, even though it’s our lowest price point. Why? If I were to say to you, pick any market in the country or the world and go look at the economy space—go pick 10 hotels randomly and look at them—you would not like what you found.”

Add it all up and Hilton is offering a vast spectrum of lodging experiences for a growing market of adventure-seekers and business travelers, but Nassetta reiterates that the back-to-basics ethos remains at the core of it all. “You can hire data scientists, hire the best consulting firms, and they’re going to come back and tell you what has been true for time and eternity, which is people want a high-quality, consistent, friendly experience.”

This is not to say that the century-old brand isn’t also investing in state-of-the-art tech, whether it’s thousands of Tesla wall connectors for guests who drive EVs or a new cloud-based “property engagement platform” that Hilton is rolling out with HotelKey. “Technology enables the service elements of what I was talking about,” Nassetta adds.

So where does that leave us with towels? Not to worry, says Nassetta. Hilton is also implementing an upgraded global “terry program” across its brands. “Every towel in the system will be revamped,” he said. “We’ll have the best towels in the business.”