Quick question for the trivia lovers: why do so many hotels avoid labeling a 13th floor, and what’s the oldest example you’ve seen? We switched to 12A/14 in 2023 and guest reassignment requests at the desk dropped from about 3 a month to almost none.
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It’s mostly demand-driven ‘triskaidekaphobia’ — like airlines skipping row 13 — and it goes back at least to early 20th‑century hotels (see Triskaidekaphobia - Wikipedia). Quick tip: align 12A across elevator panels, fire maps, and PMS so responders and staff aren’t cross‑walking floors; do you also skip room 1313?
Same experience — we relabeled 13 as “12A” and saw the real drop only after we synced it across OTAs and pre‑arrival emails so no one ever sees a 13 in search results, elevator buttons, or key sleeves. One caveat: keep the life‑safety maps and back‑of‑house systems showing the true 13 for responders while guest‑facing stays “12A”. Since you switched in 2023, did you also alias it in your PMS/OTAs or just the signage?
We kept the 13th physically but mapped it as 12A in the PMS and elevator displays, and the real drop came when we killed ‘Room 1313’ and updated evacuation maps and voice prompts — guests treat 13 like a cursed Wi‑Fi network. Caveat: for fire/EMS we still post the actual floor number in back‑of‑house and CAD notes; see Triskaidekaphobia - Wikipedia for a decent roundup. Curious if you also scrubbed 13 from floorplans and OTA room-type names.