Hotel Holiday Inn Express a Wooster

To be honest, I’m not a Holiday Inn person. It’s been decades since I’ve stayed at one but the good reviews and location to a college visit worked for what we needed. To be fair, I’ll say the stay was a mixed bag. The room was exactly like photos and pretty clean. The bed was soft, there were outlets by each side of the bed and the bathroom was sizable. Cleaning was generally good but could use a little more attention. Our bathroom wall had small specks of something by the light switch (easy to see on my opinion) and a towel that was clearly used but not noticed, re-folded and placed out as new was not a fun find. Outside of that, it looked great. The biggest issue here was this is apparently a town/area where everyone smokes. In fact, when you arrive they make you sign a sheet attesting that you will not smoke in the room or there will be fines. Clearly this doesn’t work because our first room smelled so strongly of someone smoking we could smell it from the hall. It was awful. We only had to open the door, and barely go in to tell it was disgusting. We went and asked for a room change and I swear to god we might have been asking for the front desk woman to juggle while doing a handstand the way she acted like we were putting her out. In the end, she gave us another room, two doors down. The second room was better but the hallway still smelled like cigarettes and throughout the night you’d just get whiffs of it. It’s unfortunate because it really ruins the experience otherwise. Ironically twice we needed something from the front desk and both times had to wait while the person was vaping outside. The morning front desk person was very helpful, and out talking with people, cleaning etc. There are all a million signs saying the property is 100% smoke free, one of which is near the door that hold the cigarette butt container. So, take that as you will. As for other things, beds are encased, then with two mattress pads on top. No bugs seen. They are soft but very comfortable. If you need a firmer bed for back reasons or are a bigger individual, softness may be a con. Breakfast seemed decent with cereal, those premade warmed omelets, the pancake machine, some sausage and baked goods. No yogurt on the day we were there. Things seemed to be replenished quickly but based on how guests were handling community utensils (after blowing a nose, wiping their mouth), returning to get refills with used glasses touching the spouts etc, we passed on the hotel breakfast. Personal choice and I won’t dock them for guest’s inability to buffet correctly. If you need food, it’s included and had variety. AC is loud and individual to rooms as expected with this level of hotel. It got cold quickly though and I’d imagine heating would be similar. I’ll also say that while we did hear people in the hallway, liikely due to the large undersold space, when we stayed they were generally polite with their voices, there weren’t hoards of unsupervised kids running