How to choose a resort wristband

Most wristband decisions are made backwards — a price is quoted, a material is chosen to fit it, and the wear period is discovered in August. Asked in the right order, four questions eliminate almost everything and leave a choice between two constructions.

How long does it stay on one wrist?

A day, a week, a season or a year. This single answer eliminates more of the range than the other three combined, because it sets the substrate before anything else is considered.

How wet, and what kind of wet?

A pool, the sea, a thermal circuit or none of them. Chlorine, salt and treatment oils each end different bands, and salt is considerably harsher than a swimming pool.

Does anything have to read it?

If a door, a till or a locker must respond to the band, it carries a transponder and the specification now depends on your existing systems. If not, the decision is entirely about material and print.

Who is wearing it, and what does it say about you?

A water-park session band and a villa guest's band can be technically identical and should not look alike. At the top of the market the band is a brand object; at volume it is equipment.

Wear period governs cost, not unit price

The number that matters is cost per wrist per week, and it is almost never the number in the quotation. A band that fails on day nine of a fourteen-day stay costs its own price again plus a front-desk interaction, a walk to a room, and a re-encode. Ask any supplier what proportion of a season's bands come back for replacement. Very few can answer, and the ones who can are the ones worth buying from.

Do not buy a chip you have no reader for

A surprising number of properties specify RFID bands and then discover there is nothing on site that reads them. A transponder is only worth its cost if a door, a till, a locker or a phone will interrogate it. If the band is being read by a member of staff looking at it, colour and print do the entire job and the chip is money spent on a capability nobody will use this season.

Get a physical sample before committing a season

Colour on a screen is not colour on silicone, and comfort cannot be assessed from a photograph. A sample set costs days and settles arguments that otherwise run all season. It also catches the failure that photographs never show: a band that is technically correct and simply feels wrong on a wrist, which is the one guests remove and lose.

Decide what happens to the band at the end

A band is cut off and binned, kept as a souvenir, or recovered and re-issued. All three are legitimate, and each implies a different purchase. Recovery only works where there is a natural collection point; souvenir value only exists if the band is worth keeping; disposal at volume has rules where the band contains electronics. Deciding this at the start changes the specification more than most buyers expect.

Answer the four questions with us.

Runs start at 500. Describe the property and the volume, and we come back with a specification, a unit price and samples of the recommended band.

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