The "Eco Fridge". Evaluate this idea.

[Rain Man]

I'm in a hotel tonight, and I brought some leftovers from a restaurant that I'd like to have as an early lunch tomorrow before checking out. The room has a mini-fridge, so I put the food in it.

I noticed that the fridge was warm inside. Sometimes hotels turn them off, so it wasn't a huge surprise. So I looked inside it for the dial/switch to turn it on.

There was a button on the side to turn it on, and to make a long story short, the mini-fridge is an "eco fridge" where it automatically turns off after two hours when you turn it on. If you want to keep it cool, you have to press the button again after two hours. You can keep the fridge going indefinitely, but only if you press the button every two hours.

What is your opinion of this concept? I'll post my opinion in the first post so as not to bias anyone.

[JohnnyHammersticks]

The asshole who invented that stupid thing should be chopped into 5" x 5" squares and stored in one of his own eco-fridges. Legally, of course.

[myselff77]

Find the ice machine and fill the fridge with it. Should keep your food plenty cold after it shuts off after two hours.

[Bowser]

Originally Posted by Frazod

Problem refrigerator, you say? Hmm....

ANY IDEAS??

[Frazod]

Originally Posted by Bowser

ANY IDEAS??

Other than beating you assholes to the punch, no, not really.

[TambaBerry]

Imagine someone calling your room to prank you and they ask if it's running. You're like only if I press the button. The prank caller would be so confused. So, in this scenario it seems like a great idea.

[Frazod]

On a serious note, this sounds like a lawsuit waiting to happen. There are a myriad of prescription medications that need to be refrigerated. My wife works at Walgreens. There have been a couple of times when the store lost power long enough that they had to dump thousands of dollars worth of meds because the refrigerated storage was off beyond a specified amount of time. Say someone puts this type of medication in one of these ecothings and doesn't realize it's not on, or that they have to push a button every two hours to keep it cold. It could cause the medication to go bad, leading to all sorts of nasty consequences. And even if that was not the case, is it reasonable to expect a paying customer to set an alarm and get up every two hours during the night to push a button to reactive a goddamn refrigerator, like the guy in the hatch from Lost? That's insane.

[Balto]

I mean for the large hotel with hundreds of rooms/fridges that a lot of guest don’t even use. I can see the reason why.

I’d just say the 2hr time is too short. Maybe have it last 6 or 8 hours instead of 2. What good does 2hr do anyways?

[displacedinMN]

a fridge takes longer than 2 hours to cool, then shuts off for 6-8?

what is the purpose?????


Not any different than the old school that would shut off the air at 230 pm and not start it until 740 am. but the night time temp is 70+ and the humidity is crazy.

They spent more money than just leaving it on all night.

[Frazod]

Originally Posted by Balto

I mean for the large hotel with hundreds of rooms/fridges that a lot of guest don’t even use. I can see the reason why.

I’d just say the 2hr time is too short. Maybe have it last 6 or 8 hours instead of 2. What good does 2hr do anyways?

That's a pseudo-valid point, but seriously, the far more acceptable answer is to have it off when the guest arrives, and give the guest the option to turn it on if needed. After the guest vacates the room, the cleaning staff can turn it off again. That makes sense. We're talking about little dorm room sized refrigerators here, not Tesla truck engines.

Hell, I've got a little mini-fridge in my den and have had it for years. It's not like it doubles my electric bill.

[scho63]

Just ANOTHER thing that has gotten WORSE over time.

Usually the ones I get are an ice crusted, over heated mess that don't work at all.

[BlackHelicopters]

Stupid idea.

[Bwana]

Great for the hotel from an energy standpoint, bad for the customer, if they are trying to keep something cold. I spend a lot of time in hotels, if I run into this in one of the chains I stay in, I will start staying in other chains. Please tell my this wasn't in a Hilton.

[Balto]

Originally Posted by Frazod

That's a pseudo-valid point, but seriously, the far more acceptable answer is to have it off when the guest arrives, and give the guest the option to turn it on if needed. After the guest vacates the room, the cleaning staff can turn it off again. That makes sense. We're talking about little dorm room sized refrigerators here, not Tesla truck engines.

Hell, I've got a little mini-fridge in my den and have had it for years. It's not like it doubles my electric bill.

I'm sure the penny pitchers of these hotels also factored in the percentage of times the "staff" would either not turn off/on the fridge versus forget or just don't care to mess with it. Having an on/off button for the visitor puts the responsibility on them IF they would like to use it.

I guess they could stop putting fridges in the rooms all together and only bring one up to you if requested. Then you have wasted storage space for a bunch of mini fridges haha.

If you look at all the options and the main goal for the hotel is how to save even the slightest amount of money but still provide a fridge.....what they did seems to fit. I'd still compromise and put a 6hr or 8hr time limit instead of 2hrs.

[Pasta Little Brioni]

Saving teh energy and planet! Completely useless BUT...

[ThaVirus]

Originally Posted by Balto

I mean for the large hotel with hundreds of rooms/fridges that a lot of guest don’t even use. I can see the reason why.

I’d just say the 2hr time is too short. Maybe have it last 6 or 8 hours instead of 2. What good does 2hr do anyways?

Agreed on the longer time limit, though I do wonder what the actual cost difference would be overall. You know, kind of like how they say it’s actually better to keep your AC at 78 all day as opposed to turning it up to 80 all day and then 70 when you get home.