“Things are made for families of 4”

[Fairylights87]

What does it mean that things are just made for families of 4 like hotels, tickets etc. ?

I read this argument against having more than 2 kids in many threads but what does it mean?

Can people not book AirBnb or cottages etc. for holidays? Interconnecting rooms with a sofa bed isn’t a solution for larger families? When you book tickets can’t you book 2 adults and 3 kids when you make the booking?

Why people say that everything is structured for families of 4?

Can you please give me examples that this was an issue?

The main thing we find difficult with 3 kids is hotels/holidays. Often the price jumps dramatically and options are greatly reduces as most hotels only cater for up to 4 and if you need a bigger room it's often a suite etc or 2 rooms.

Also if you need 3 car seats in the back of a car, that's a pest.

But it's a choice normally, of course it costs more for more children. But I've stayed in many 5 bedded rooms,look at independent hotels

I was pricing up a hotel recently, their standard family room sleeps 2 adults and 2 children at a cost of £4k. We have 3 kids, which meant we couldn't have that room, the only room type was a fancy suite, which cost £8.5k. So to take one extra child more than doubled the price. We can't afford / justify that extra cost so we'll have to find a different hotel.

Getting taxis on holiday is difficult, they only seat 4 people plus the driver, so we often have to get two - again, doubles the cost.

We find ways around it, but it's more complicated and rules out many options.

Also cost of tickets - you can usually get two for one for Merlin attractions but with 3 children it doesn't work. If it's £50 per ticket, with BOGOF it's £100 for 4 but £150 for 5.

We like hello fresh / gousto, they serve 4 rather than 5.

We were only ever going to have two children for all the reasons outlined above.
Like a PP, we thought ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to give DS1 a sibling’, and ended up with surprise twins when DS1 was 2.5.

We had to get a new car that could fit 3 car seats in a row. A massive purchase we had NOT budgeted for.

Very modest holidays that would have been within our reach financially with 2 DC were too expensive because of having to get an extra room for the third child. The rules of many holiday cottages mean you’re not allowed to squeeze a third child into a two bed place, even though they’d easily fit on an airbed or sofabed, so that pushes you into bigger properties than you can afford. So we just didn’t go on holiday!

We are able to afford a trip abroad for the first time this summer (in the nearly 7 years since the twins were born), and one of us will have to stay in a different ferry cabin with one of the children (there are only 2 berth and 4 berth cabins so we had to get two cabins) because, as others have pointed out, the cabins / rooms are not always together!

In a lot of restaurants there are often plenty of tables for 2 or 4. If there are 5 of you, you often get seated at a table for 6 and someone has to be on one side at the end, leaning round to be part of things.

Don’t even get me started on theme park rides with 3 small children. It’s like a management training exercise.

None of this is a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but our experience as an accidental family of 5 has been that generally things are set up for families of 4, and it doesn’t half wear you down after a while.

I don’t really understand your point, OP. Yes of course people can ‘just’ book an extra room or an extra ticket for something, but 9 times out of 10, doing that is disproportionately more expensive and / or faffy! And it’s ALL THE TIME.
•collapses on sofa with back of hand on forehead• It’s been a long few years. 🙇🏼‍♀️

Where we live there is a yearly event that is hard to get tickets for. Work does a lottery so you can apply then get tickets for the event but you can only purchase 2 or 4. So we can no longer participate. The other way to get tickets is to wait for someone that buys the full season to sell off the one they don’t want but also normally 2/4 tickets on offer.

We rarely stay in hotels but had to with our four for an extended family event last month. DH had to leave unexpectedly and I needed to book us an extra night. Really struggled as the teens weren't allowed to have a room without an adult in it and we couldn't have 5 to a room.

So it's that type of thing that's tricky. Especially with online booking as there's no discretion.

Booking a hotel room for more than 2 adults/2 children usually means 2 rooms, doubling the cost. Even with interconnected rooms you still have to pay for both rooms.

“Interconnecting rooms with a sofa bed…”

is rocking horse shit.

5 jam or custard donuts in a packet too. 😄

It's the disproportionately extra cost. As a family of 4...let's say (for example) your break costs £1000 (so £250 per head).
When you need to house a family of 5...the cottages, apartments, interconnecting rooms are all ALOT more expensive that a simple room for 4. So your cost will often be closer to £2000.... which is £400 per head despite only 1 extra person

Hotels and taxis are a pita. Obviously you can book a bigger air bnb but, also obviously, air bnbs for 5/6+ are rarer and more expensive than for 4. It limits your options. Lodge type holidays are usually an even number and you end up paying for a room you won’t even use because the kids want to be together anyway, I only use taxis occasionally on holiday but you can’t just jump in at the airport, you have to either jump in 2 taxis (2x the cost for 1 extra person, or book a bigger taxi, which is often a lot more and can take a bit of organising.
I’ve ONCE managed to successfully book interconnected rooms but failed about 1000 times.
Hotels have a place alongside air bnbs (airport hotels, overnight stop on the motorway) so it doesn’t really matter if an individual prefers non - hotel accommodation because it’s often a necessary pita. Air bnb creates a lot of social problems and really it would be better if more hotels had a range of accommodation for families.
Food doesn’t bother me that much but I default to big bowls of “stuf” rather than things that come in a number like burgers etc. I make a few pasta dishes that use deconstructed sausages. I wonder if this is a reaction to the way things are packaged (although loads of sausages come in packs of 6 - for who I wonder)