The Mulberry Extended Stay Hotel — Hotel in Westlake

I'm going to be honest, and say that I don't know how this is almost a full 5 star hotel, or equivalent to a 9.7/10.

I'll start by the rooms PROs. I stayed in room 215, which is an ADA accessible king suite:

• The fact that it's ADA accessible is a nice accommodation, although we aren't disabled it was the only availability they had for that type of room (I booked a few months in advance). • large, spacious room and bathroom • plenty of lighting and lamps, but not so it's overpowering • smell wasn't moldy or funky like some people were claiming in the reviews, although the bathroom DID have an grandma-house smell—but I didn't find it stinky. • Has a TV with adapter cables, so you can stream Netflix from your computer onto the TV, play Nintendo Switch/any console, ect • came with a spacious desk to do any work or for something to put your things down • clean kitchenette with dishes, silverware, and plates/bowls. The refrigerator and freezer worked and was clean. • no bed bugs! Just a few ants from the cracks in the window after a bad rain. I spotted only 3 and no more.

Rooms CONs: • Not quiet at all.. the walls are as thin as paper. We could hear others' televisions from our room when trying to sleep. We would have to turn on the A/C to drown out the noise. We could also hear the service bell/phone all the way from the front desk.. at the first floor by the entrance. We were on the second floor. The night before we left there was someone on speakerphone at 1 am which was really annoying. • There was bits of mold on the ceiling above the A/C and black mold spots growing on the ceiling from the bathroom. • Bathroom air vent didn't work, so when we would take showers we'd have to leave the bathroom door open • the room would become very stuffy/humid as soon as the a/c would turn off, so I'd sometimes wake up in a hot sweat. • the sheets were clearly washed, but stained. There looked to be bloodstains on the comforter and mattress topper which was really gross, but it was very old stains so at least it was washed and dried multiple times. I also washed the sheets using the guest laundry just in case. They should have thrown those out given how many stains there were. • no water pressure, so it was a pain to take a shower with no stream pressure. • the shower curtains were a horrible choice. They're made of some kind of fabric that's a potential breeding ground for mold, when I'd wash my hair or shave, bits of hair would get literally stuck to the curtain. You couldn't clean it until it was 100% dry. It would have made better sense to use waterproof curtains or at least a plastic liner to keep water in. • the coat hangers for some reason a little complicated, so I was lucky to have brought my own since I was staying for 6 nights.

Service PROs: very nice breakfast in the morning, just wished they'd serve until 10 all mornings but I can understand why it's only 7-9 am. when paged by the phone, front desk staff are very prompt to answer. The housekeeping staff did well on not coming into our room with the do not disturb sign on the door handle staff promptly gave us fresh towels and new rolls of toilet paper

Service CONs: I was taken aback by one of the front desk staff members when I asked for a second round of towels. I'm not disabled, but I was in the ADA room due to availability.. and she asked that I bring the towels to her and pick them up at the desk when last time they came to my room. That isn't a problem for me, but you'd think they'd have ADA rooms on a note or something, because that would have been inconsiderate to ask a handicapped person to go all the way downstairs to get towels. some of the people answering the phone were a bit rude. Before booking I asked when they're going to charge my card, and got a little attitude with the response. It's ridiculous to me that they charge for using the laundry machines.. and there's only ONE dryer and washer!

For location... It's by a lot of restaurants and casinos! Only downside is there's a train that's unpredictable...

We had a terrible experience at the Mulberry. But I will start with the good. The exterior and public areas are well-lit and look like they are well taken care of. Check in was smooth, however, the trouble for us started when we got to our room and immediately smelled a strong odor of stale cigarette smoke. We set our bags down and began to survey the rest of the room which looked nice, when the smoke detector beeped. Then 30 seconds later beeped again and continued on. We went to the desk and requested a different room after explaining the situation. There was no empathy from the clerk, No apology as she told us, “ there are no more rooms.” I asked her if there was a maintenance person she could call about the smoke detector and she went on to explain to me that there is no one she can call, the owner lives over an hour away, and she was not willing to call another hotel in the area for me. I told the clerk that I wasn’t willing to tamper with a smoke detector in a hotel, and asked her how this was my problem? Again, no empathy and no indication she would do anything to assist with the problem. We returned to the room to stash our luggage, and began searching for other hotels in the area. After we found several highly rated hotels that had rooms available, The clerk called our room and said she had called the owner, and the owner was responding. It was after 9:30PM, we had been traveling all day during a cross country move, and we decided to go to waffle House down the street for dinner while we decided what to do. We decided that even if the owner showed up with a ladder and a 9 volt battery (over an hour later) to fix the smoke detector, the room still reeked, and by morning we would too. We booked at a nearby national chain and had a very nice room and good service. When we checked out after our dinner And asked for a refund, the clerk responded by telling us “I can’t do that“. Which was not surprising after her other responses to our concerns. The next day the charges were reversed and we were happy with that. My impression is that the owners probably do a nice job with this place overall, but this clerk was not trained in any kind of customer service or dealing with issues, and was utterly helpless when it came to even small issues. Their maintenance people dropped the ball by not replacing the smoke detector batteries on a schedule ahead of time, and their housekeeping dropped the ball by signing off on a room that obviously stunk. The owner dropped the ball by having a clerk with poor customer service skills and no resources to...

e|We had a terrible experience at the Mulberry. But I will start with the good. The exterior and public areas are well-lit and look like they are well taken care of. Check in was smooth, however, the trouble for us started when we got to our room and immediately smelled a strong odor of stale cigarette smoke. We set our bags down and began to survey the rest of the room which looked nice, when the smoke detector beeped. Then 30 seconds later beeped again and continued on.|We went to the desk and requested a different room after explaining the situation. There was no empathy from the clerk, No apology as she told us, “ there are no more rooms.” I asked her if there was a maintenance person she could call about the smoke detector and she went on to explain to me that there is no one she can call, the owner lives over an hour away, and she was not willing to call another hotel in the area for me. I told the clerk that I wasn’t willing to tamper with a smoke detector in a hotel, and asked her how this was my problem? Again, no empathy and no indication she would do anything to assist with the problem.|We returned to the room to stash our luggage, and began searching for other hotels in the area. After we found several highly rated hotels that had rooms available, The clerk called our room and said she had called the owner, and the owner was responding. It was after 9:30PM, we had been traveling all day during a cross country move, and we decided to go to waffle House down the street for dinner while we decided what to do.|We decided that even if the owner showed up with a ladder and a 9 volt battery (over an hour later) to fix the smoke detector, the room still reeked, and by morning we would too. We booked at a nearby national chain and had a very nice room and good service.|When we checked out after our dinner And asked for a refund, the clerk responded by telling us “I can’t do that“. Which was not surprising after her other responses to our concerns. The next day the charges were reversed and we were happy with that.|My impression is that the owners probably do a nice job with this place overall, but this clerk was not trained in any kind of customer service or dealing with issues, and was utterly helpless when it came to even small issues. Their maintenance people dropped the ball by not replacing the smoke detector batteries on a schedule ahead of time, and their housekeeping dropped the ball by signing off on a room that obviously stunk. The owner dropped the ball by having a clerk with poor customer service skills and no resources to...