Contact:          Neil Alumkal

                        neil@5wpr.com

                        (212) 999-5585 x209

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Size Does Matter!

GOTHAM-BOUND TRAVELERS BEWARE:

Calculate Price Per Square Foot Before You Book,

To Learn “True Value”

NEW YORK, July 19^th, 2004 – “Our first room was the size of a closet” lament out-of-towners on a recent TripAdvisor.com post, after staying at a fashionable boutique hotel in New York.  A hard lesson learned for business and leisure travelers alike booking hotels online, or through agents, is that thumbnail-sized jpegs of New York hotel rooms can be nearly true to size.  More importantly, travelers should not just compare room rates when planning a trip to the Big Apple, but also room size to learn the “true value” of what they are buying.

The solution is a simple formula more common in real estate than travel: divide the room rate by the number of square feet.  So if the room costs $200 per night for 200 square feet, the rate per square foot is $1.

Most travelers would be surprised to learn there is a huge discrepancy in True Value in the Big Apple, and although they thought they were getting value for their dollars, they might not have been. 

Below is a survey of Midtown Manhattan hotels including room size (in square feet), room rates and the calculated rate per square footage:

* Published rates from reservations listed on July 9, 2004 for a room reservation for Tuesday, August 3^rd (double occupancy, one night).

Square inch for square inch, New York’s Buckingham Hotel offers you more for your “Buck,” and it does so right in the heart of Midtown, across from Carnegie Hall. With its exceptionally spacious suites, each with a fully equipped kitchen, the Buckingham Hotel presents a value as much as five times that of other well-known boutique hotels in terms of rate per square footage.

About the Buckingham

Now celebrating its 75^th Anniversary, the Buckingham is perfectly located on 57th Street and 6^th Avenue in Manhattan.  With décor that echoes the red velvet and dark wood of the famed concert hall, the Buckingham has been host to the world’s top classical musicians and other celebrities for generations. 

Other amenities at the Buckingham include a pre-arrival concierge service, full-service business center, in-room high-speed Internet connection, wired meeting space and a 24-hour state-of-the-art fitness center with private shower and sauna.

The Patrons’ Lounge offers a flat-panel television that screens CNBC by day and Carnegie Hall-themed movies by night.  The Buckingham also offers a lending library of live Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center music and performance on CD and DVD.  

The property is just seconds from Central Park, David Letterman’s Ed Sullivan Theatre, Steinway’s piano gallery, the Museum of Modern Art, the renowned 57^th Street art galleries as well as shopping destinations like Prada, Gucci, Bergdorf Goodman’s and Barney’s.

Stylish and smart, the public spaces of the Buckingham are filled with music and commissioned artwork from the property’s own permanent collection – starting right at the front door with the Buckingham’s signature stained glass “Dancing King” and eleven unique installations of deconstructed musical instruments (“Bounce Fugue”) that line the entrance way.

At the Buckingham Hotel, the true value of a dollar is much more than a square foot. For more information visit the Buckingham Hotel Web site at www.buckinghamhotel.com

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