How Forbes Travel Guide Evaluates Hotels

Forbes Travel Guide (FTG) is an independent global rating system. Professional inspectors stay as paying guests — anonymously — and evaluate hotels against a large library of objective standards (publicly described as approaching ~900 criteria for hotels).

Key principles for Mr C Coconut Grove teams: 1. You will not know when they visit. Treat every guest as a potential inspector. 2. Service typically drives ~75% of the composite; facilities ~25%. A beautiful room cannot save cold service. 3. Standards are objective and binary in spirit — either the behavior/condition happened to standard, or it did not. 4. Ratings cannot be purchased. Preparation is operational excellence, not marketing spend. 5. Personalization is the differentiator between four-star competence and five-star feeling.

Inspectors experience the full journey: reservation, arrival, in-stay (rooms, dining, requests, public areas, wellness), and departure. Gaps compound across departments when preferences fail to travel with the guest.