Aloft Milwaukee Downtown — Hotel in Milwaukee

I personally would never recommend this hotel to anybody, and I personally will never stay here again or any aloft in the future. So many things went wrong- I'll break them down.

Booking:

I had my wedding block held at this hotel. After several emails back and forth and securing my block we opened it up to my guests. Who then were told there was no block under my name to book a room. So my guests starting booking rooms at other hotels. Finally got that figured out and then I sent out an email asking about hosting a post wedding event at the hotel. My email got bounced back to me. I had to call several times to figure out what was going on and apparently the Sales Coordinator I was working with no longer worked there and nobody thought it was important to pass that information along to their current customers. And then this happened again....three more times. They went through three different Sales Coordinators without telling anybody in a period of six months. It was incredibly frustrating to get anything done when my emails were constantly getting bounced back and I would have to hunt down someone on the phone who didn't have answers for me.

I also tried to upgrade my own personal room to a bigger room to get ready in. When booking you aren't told there are different levels of room and on the website it doesn't even look like there are however a friend told me they had a room with an attached lounge type area. When trying to upgrade my room (as the Bride for my wedding night) they told me the room was available but I could not upgrade. What they wanted me to do was cancel my current room (which would have cost the same amount as it did to book it) and then book the bigger room. So essentially pay for two rooms and only have one. I had to speak to three different people and FINALLY someone called me back with massive attitude telling me I can upgrade and pay the difference. Thanks. Not to mention I am a SPG member.

The Stay:

Valet Parking. At this hotel you have to and it was $20+ a day. When we came back from our rehearsal dinner there was no valet to be found anywhere. We waited for 5 mins and then my husband locked our car and gave our keys to the front desk. Half an hour later I needed to get something from the car so I went down to valet and again...nobody was around. I asked the front desk for my keys and they had to hunt them down.. I went outside and saw my car was moved to halfway onto the sidewalk not in the valet parking lot. I checked to see if the car was locked and it wasn't. So I opened the door and started grabbing the things I needed. At this point the valet woman came over and asked me what I was doing. I asked why my car has been sitting in front of the hotel on the sidewalk unlocked for the last half hour. The woman snapped back at me that there was no way it was for half an hour to which I replied actually it was. Then she said "If you don't like it you can park your car yourself" She was incredibly inappropriate.

After the rehearsal dinner we all met back down in the lounge to have a drink at the bar. The bartender served everyone but me. One of my bridesmaids even made a comment to her that I was the Bride and tried to order me a drink..which was ignored. We were covering the entire parties bar bill that night which wasn't small by any means...you'd think I'd be able to get a drink myself. We left the bar.

My brother who wasn't able to book under the block (because they told him there wasn't one) parked his car in one of the two spots on the property. We checked countless times to make sure it was okay as he wasn't a guest at the hotel. They okayed it every time we check. Except he got literally yelled at the next day when he went to go get his car and they tried to stop him from leaving.

When you are getting married, or staying at a hotel for any reason...its just incredibly frustrating to have to deal with any of these things. And I didn't even have room to type up all of my frustrations. We stayed over the...

The best part of this hotel experience is the location - centrally located in downtown Milwaukee, right on the river and close to the Fiserv Forum and Lakefront Brewery (15 minute walk). The hotel was recommended to me by a friend who visited years ago (pre-COVID). So the hotel was in need of a bit of upkeep - there were some noticeable stains on the carpet in the hallways, for example, and a hole in the wall of the workout room. The staff was incredibly friendly, but some people seemed a bit new. For example, when we asked for towels for use in the pool area, we were provided tiny hand-sized towels. The pool is very small, so we had to reserve time in it (due to COVID-19), but this was fine. There were no paper towels in the workout room; but as soon as we asked, there were several staff people who came in to replace the hand towels and clean the equipment after we used them. There is no restaurant in the hotel, but you can order room service from a local restaurant (we didn't try the food). The bar at the hotel was not open the second night of our stay (Monday). The staff were able to direct us to get to Lakefront Brewery, but they didn't know or tell us that it closes at 5pm on Sundays, so when we got there, it was closing (and we were very hungry!) The hotel is located right on the river, so we had a great view. I wish the price of parking was included, but the valets were really pleasant and helpful as well. There was also no housekeeping provided - due to COVID - but we only stayed two nights, so this was okay. The only problem was that we didn't get anything refreshed, such as coffee in our room; we were told we could get more towels, etc. at the front desk. But the lobby offered complimentary coffee, so that was okay too. And there was a nice offering at the "market" in the lobby, such as snacks, water, etc. The other big problem is that I wanted to use the Marriott gift card I received by applying for and receiving the Marriott Bonvoy credit card, but the manager was unable to access the system to apply the gift card. I don't know if this was due to Aloft being a new member of the Marriott family? Overall, Aloft is a nice boutique hotel that is in need of some basic maintenance and upkeep but it was affordable and comfortable (rooms a bit on the small side), and I hope is recovering well (financially) after...

More like a 4.5 as this hotel was great, beautiful front lobby/entrance with friendly staff, valet parking, games and pool table, fireplace with lounge area, a pool, grab and go food and drinks, coffee area, meeting rooms and more. We reserved online and had zero hassle checking in, went up to our room located on the 3rd floor overlooking the deer district (we were only staying 1 night so room view wasn't a concern for us, while they do have rooms overlooking water for the view) and found a very comfortable bed, clean room, TV, bathroom with perfect sized shower, safe, and mini fridge. The setup was basic but easy to get around, and the decor was simple yet added a nice touch to the room. Very loud at night and early morning with construction, woke us up, BUT ... They have a sign right next to the bed if the loud noise from the traffic and location are hindering sleep to call the front desk to help with options. We didn't do that, not sure if they could relocate you or offer ear plugs but that's an option. We went to the bucks game and walked back to the hotel to a secure entrance after a certain time where you need a key to enter which was nice. Again, bed was very comfy and perfect amount of pillows, we did get some food from the little area downstairs, had a wrap and some chips which were really good and fresh. We were able to check in early and check out was 11 am which was ample time to get everything ready even sleep in a bit. For the room I only gave 4 stars because it was a little small and the heating/cooling was a little loud I had to turn it off. The hotel is smoke free which was really nice, the room was very clean, not sure if on purpose but there were no bags in the trash cans- I don't mind because I figure it's more environmentally friendly. Service from everyone we interacted with was amazing- the 2 ladies at check in were incredibly friendly, the gentleman during the overnight shift was really nice and that's when we got some food so he had to ring that up, and checking out was easy and fast with the friendly morning staff. For location it was really convenient for us to go to the bucks game, but for others it might be a negative being downtown and can get loud late and very early with local construction.

Would highly recommend this hotel and plan to stay again when we are...