Gogglebox favourites Steph and Dom on early starts, problem staff and their new hotel reality show

Steph and Dom Parker are in The Great Hotel Escape, which begins today at 4pm on Channel 4.

Here, they answer our questions…

What is The Great Hotel Escape about?

Dom: In the distant past, Steph and I used to run a hotel. It’s 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It can be relentless. And so this follows a number of great souls who have done what we did. They go through the pitfalls we did. Almost every single problem you see throughout the series, we experienced at one stage or another.

What sort of problems did you deal with as hoteliers?

Steph: Everything! From loos that break down in the middle of the night to boilers that won’t produce hot water. We had a chef who got arrested mid-service – I wandered into the kitchen and he’d been carted away by the police for something or other.

Did you have any strange complaints?

Dom: There was a woman who came to dinner in the hotel with her boyfriend, wearing nothing but a coat. She very quietly exposed herself to him. We had a complaint from another guest – but the objection was because the coat was made of fur!

What makes a good hotel?

Steph: As beautiful, spotless and immaculate as your hotel might very well be, it’s not everything. Guests will probably choose your hotel because of your website and because of nice photographs. But they will return to your hotel not because of the colour of the walls, but because of the service!

Did you have to advise any of the hoteliers?

Dom: Everybody seemed to pretty much have the right idea. Some were a little shy and needed to be pushed to open up a little, but they were generally lovely. Some hoteliers are terrified of getting a single bad review on TripAdvisor. But when I go to a hotel I’m not looking for one bad review, I’m looking for trends.

Have you ever complained in a hotel?

Dom: I stayed in one recently and the door handle was broken – a simple thing. I told the staff about it and came back at the end of the day to see nothing had been done. It wouldn’t have taken anybody very long to screw it back, but somebody just couldn’t be bothered.

Is part of your job counselling the owners of these hotels?

Steph: Us rocking up is almost a bit of a release. They can actually collapse a bit, have a little bit of a cry and a moan – and we basically pick them up, dust them down, and send them on their merry way again. Hopefully with a sort of renewed passion!