Hotels used to be one of my favorite shops. You get to stay at a really nice place and often have drinks and meals and, sometimes even a spa treatment. But they can be quite overwhelming. There are often more than 40 individual shops to complete from arrival to departure, which is usually only about 18 hours, or from about 4 PM check-in to 10 AM check-out. I’ll tell you how that works.

I had the opportunity to evaluate a very nice place in Breckenridge, Colorado. Check in was 4 PM but before that, I had to evaluate the exterior appearance of the building (1), the parking lot (2), the valet (3) and the doorman (4) all before I set foot inside the building.

Once inside, I had to evaluate the front desk staff (5), the concierge (6) and the bellhop (7). Once the bellhop took me to my room, I had to evaluate the cleanliness of the room (8) and make a call to both housekeeping (9) and maintenance (10) to report a problem. Then I had to wait for them to show up and evaluate how well they handled the issues. (11,12)

While I was waiting, I had to make a reservation at the hotel restaurant (13) for dinner and order room service (14). On this occasion, the person who delivered room service was also the hostess at the restaurant. (More on how I handled that later.)

Once room service showed up with dinner (15), I had to go to the bar (16) and spend an hour there but I was only able to order one drink. After one drink, I had to order a non-alcoholic drink and something from their food menu. On this occasion, the person who delivered the food to the bar was also the hostess at the restaurant. (More on how I handled that later, too.)

After the bar, I had to evaluate the hostess, server, manager, cocktail waitress, and food at the restaurant (17, 18, 19, 20, 21) then get back to my room and set up a wake-up call (22). Then I had to start writing reports for all the observations.

After my wake up call the next morning (23), I had to go to the cafe and order breakfast (24). After breakfast, I had to evaluate the interior of the building (25) and visit one of the public restrooms (26). I also had to stop and make a small purchase at the gift shop (27) before checking out. At check out, I had to evaluate the bell hop again (28) as well as the front desk attendant (29) and the valet at departure (30). If you’ve been counting, I am now at 30 evaluations in 18 hours. And I never even got to take a shower!

I also had to explain why I ordered room service then went to the bar and ordered appetizers then went to the restaurant and ordered at least one appetizer, two different entrees, a dessert and two alcoholic beverages without being tagged as a shopper.

Well, once I ordered room service and it was delivered by Carla, I wrapped it up and put it in the mini fridge. I then went to the bar and ordered a drink (required). After about 20 minutes, I had to wait to see if I’d be offered a second drink and order a soft drink along with some food. By the time Carla delivered the food to the bar, it had been about 30 minutes since she had delivered room service. When I saw her, I told her my son wanted to eat in the room since he wasn’t feeling well but we wanted to eat in the bar. I hoped she hadn’t noticed that we only had one king bed in the room. At this point, I didn’t know she was also the hostess at the restaurant.

When we got to the restaurant about 30 minutes later, I panicked for a second when I saw her at the hostess station. Remember, we had already made a reservation for 7 PM and we had to keep it. I approached her and said, “Wow, you have a lot of jobs here, don’t you?” I laughed and said that we wanted to go someplace a bit quieter for dinner. She smiled and said she understood but honestly, by now, I think she was starting to get suspicious.

We finished dinner around 8:30 PM and I wrote reports until almost midnight. We had ordered a cheeseburger and fries, a Reuben sandwich, a Coke and an ice tea, and a slice of cheesecake from room service. We had each ordered a drink and a soft drink at the bar as well as a plate of nachos. We then ordered two glasses of wine, an order of stuffed mushrooms, a steak and a pasta dish as well as a slice of chocolate cake at dinner. The next morning, we ordered a breakfast burrito and a ham scramble along with a bagel, a blueberry muffin and two coffees. We needed a bag to carry our leftovers out.

Once I got home, I spent the next 8 hours writing reports. I got paid $150 for the 30 evaluations, which took me about 12 hours total to write. The reimbursement for the hotel and all the required purchases (about $700) took 45 days to get and if they didn’t like any of my reports or I forgot to get a receipt for something, they could have denied my entire shop, so I lived with anxiety until the shop cleared the editor.

My husband loves these shops. So much free food and an overnight stay at a very nice hotel. What’s not to like? He even got to take a shower and took a dip in the pool! I, on the other hand, worked like a dog and wore out my brain remembering everyone’s name and the greeting they gave me. I’d still rather do a couple of well-paying bank shops and pay my own way on our next little getaway. Let the newbies pick up these behemoths.