Hotel Norden — Hotel in Haderslev Municipality

This is a kind of difficult review to write, but I think one of the great things about Tripadvisor is to remain dispassionate and to help other travellers manage their expectations, so the Bottom Line Up Front is this hotel was perfectly fine for a 5-night business trip, but there are some caveats.||||Firstly the good stuff. ||||Great location. The hotel is on the western side of Haderslev, easy access from the motorway and once settled in, just a 5-10 minute walk into the centre of town which has a pretty wide variety of places to eat. ||||Nice views overlooking the grounds and lake, particularly from the dining room. ||||It's clean, has great w-fi, and puts on a pretty good breakfast (which was the only meal we took in the hotel). It also has a comfortable bar, only a small selection of beers, but enough for us.||||Now for the middling stuff. ||||Once away from the nice, bright reception area, it reminded me of my primary school from the 1970s! And walking into the corridor to my room, a flashback to being in on an overnight North Sea ferry. ||||The room itself was basic. Bed (which was comfortable), chair, fixed desk, one drawer for storage but quite a bit of hanging space. Oh, and the tele, which I never switched on. The bathroom (shower) was clean, but again strictly functional. No fridge, water or any beverage making stuff. Big window across the width of the room, but the curtains were ok for surpressing the early morning light. my room faced the back of the hotel, so sleep was disturbed from 05:00 with delivery lorries reversing into the space.||||Parking. On first glance, there appears to be loads of parking. However, returning from work at about 17:30, I routinely found it to be pretty full. On one occasion, it was 100% full and I had to find elsewhere. I think it's shared with people visiting the park, or why else would you have to pay extra (45DKK) for an overnight parking ticket?||||Breakfast doesn't start until 07:00. Our working day started at 07:30, so that wasn't good. However, the hotel was super busy with contractors working at the nearby air base (If you want to discover everything about the F-35 fighter programme, this hotel comes strongly recommended), also in the same boat as us. So kudos for the staff for having breakfast ready to go at 06:30 (the cold stuff only), but that was good enough for us and very much appreciated. Without that, the hotel would have been unsatisfactory for our requirements (you can't fly on an empty stomach). ||||The not-so-good stuff.||||It seems the hotel is trying to operate with the minimum staff. Reception is staffed within strict hours only. There is a bell, but the person answering it might not be fully qualified, so for example if you have an early check-out, I would offer that clearing the bill the evening before might be a very good idea. ||||Also, one person would seem be doing multi-tasking: reception, bar, dining room. So again, a bell for the bar service. And if paying cash, they would have to go elsewhere to get the change. And one evening I needed some printing done, but I couldn't e-mail an attachment to reception as the staff member didn't seem qualified to print. Being informed that it could be done next morning wasn't exactly helpful as we were leaving at 07:00, just as reception was being staffed.||||Overall||||But actually we quite liked the place, it met our needs and was comfortable. We would happily stay again, but for a first-time visitor, do manage your...

A hotel or restaurant can get away with a lot if only the staff is friendly and service minded but this hotel had not all but a few staff with an attitude problem. Firstly the reception was not manned after 18.00 at not all the time until 18.00. You had to ring a bell to get their attention in both the bar and the reception especially after 18.00 and when you did get someone to come it felt like we were disturbing them. They were very bad at answering the phone and after 18.00 no one did. The young head waitress by way of greeting us upon arrival after a full day of travelling on a flight, 3 trains and a taxi said that I had no reservation although I had a confirmation of the reservation and the restaurant was not more than half full if even that. After reluctantly seating us at a table out side she told us that we could only have the a la carte and there were 3 main dishes to chose from. She then went on to tell us that even though it said that the bar was open until 24.00 they would close it at 22.00 if there was no one in it at that time. The 2 main dishes we chose were good. The next day when I asked for a recommendation of restaurants the receptionist made me wait and took other guests in between then finally printed out a list and I asked if she could help me to recommend anything, she put a cross in front of one (it was a good choice) and when I asked her to do a reservation she just said in a very unfriendly way, "you can do it yourself". When I asked if I could help with a car rental she just said no and when I asked for information about the golf course she just said that there was one and turned back to her desk. If a light broke it says in their brochure that you can go and get a bulb in the reception...! The young head waitress had the same bad attitude on our last evening when we decided to eat there again for practical reasons more than for pleasure. This time there were 2 main dishes out of 4 on their a la carte menu to chose from and as I didn't want to eat meat I took the same salmon dish again which 3 days earlier and according to the menu was to be served with asparagus, this evening they instead served it with cabbage which was not nice and when I commented on the difference I was rudely told that asparagus was not in season... which of course was not true. I saw other guests being equally badly treated. The breakfast buffet was limited in choice and not something you longed for. The room, I think they called it a mini double room was just that and very dated. The so called double bed was more like a single and as the room was so small the bed was pushed up against one wall with only 1 bedside table. The place needs money spent and a lot of...

My stay at Hotel Norden was nothing short of disappointing, and I would strongly advise against booking this hotel.

Breakfast – A Complete Letdown

For the price they charge, the breakfast selection is extremely poor. On Monday, January 27, 2025, it was even worse than usual—by far the most inadequate breakfast I have encountered in all my travels. There was barely anything to choose from, making it a complete waste of money.

Dinner – Below Average at Best

The dinner quality is mediocre at best and certainly not worth the price. If I had to rate it, I would give it a 1/10.

Rooms & Bathrooms – Small, Outdated, and Unpleasant

The rooms are small, outdated, and have an unpleasant smell. The same goes for the bathrooms, which are cramped and in dire need of renovation.

Overall Experience – A Greedy and Mismanaged Hotel

While the staff tries to be polite and accommodating, it is clear that the owners prioritize profit over guest satisfaction. There is no reception service after 14:00–15:00, which is highly inconvenient.

At check-in, we received an email with a PIN code for entry. However, our room keys and names were simply left in an envelope at the reception desk—a serious GDPR violation that raises concerns about privacy and security.

Hidden Fees & Currency Exchange Scam

To make matters worse, if you pay by card, the hotel applies an unfair exchange rate of 1 EUR to 7 DKK, whereas banks offer rates between 7.4 and 7.56 DKK per EUR. This blatant overcharging is yet another way for the owners to squeeze extra money out of guests.

Final Verdict

This hotel is a complete disaster—overpriced, poorly managed, and focused only on maximizing profit at the expense of guests. I will never return and strongly recommend that others avoid it...