My family and I normally stay at a Marriott or Hya...

My family and I normally stay at a Marriott or Hyatt; I have only stayed in two Sheraton hotels and have to say I am not impressed! Exhausted, tired kids, and checking in at 10:30 pm. My first impression of the Sheraton Gateway LAX has a distinct smell of bad musk cologne. I kept turning around trying to find the guy that would dive into the much cologne until I realized it was the hotel! When I walked up to the Front Desk the agent did not even look up and greet me. She just stared at the computer screen and asked for my driver's license and credit card - I felt like I was at the DMV. I just stood there waiting for her to look up (which took a few seconds) and then asked her if she even knew what I looked like. I expressed my disappointment with the last Sheraton I stayed at the night before and was hoping this one would be better. She did express her regret that our last stay at a Sheraton was not a good experience, apologized for the lack of a greeting and offered me four free breakfast buffet vouchers. I thought that was nice of her. She asked if I was parking a car and I said yes I was packing a rental car. She stated there were three options; the first one was a onetime self-parking of eleven dollars, the second option was an in and out self-parking for seventeen dollars, and the third was valet parking for thirty-three dollars. Thirty-three dollars a night for valet parking... really? Well, I took the seventeen dollar option and was given a card to use. What I was not told by her was it was not an access card into the airports long-term parking (it appears they do not have a parking lot themselves) so my card was eaten by the machine and I had to wait twenty minutes for an parking attendant to arrive to fix it.

When I finally arrived to room it appeared clean except for the carpet which was dirty and stained. It was not until I climbed into bed and found three type of hairs in-between the pillows that I had an issue with the room - one being a pubic hair. I called down to the front desk to see If I could get the bedding changed and was transfer to another person that agreed to send someone up to the room to take care of the issue. I waited for thirty minutes with my sleepy son until I hear a knock on the door. In walks a guy with two pillows, lays the pillows on the bed and say "okay?!" I asked if he would change the bedding and he responded with another "okay?!" and turn to leave. I asked him again to take care of the situation and he finally realized what I was asking him to do. His response was to brush the hairs off the bed and onto the floor. At that point he says "okay?!" I told him fine I will deal with other peoples hair and said "okay".

The shower was old and the showerhead was calcified.

The downstairs concierge seemed to never be at the desk when needed.

On the plus side:

Internet was free
There was no "resort fee"

You get one small free bottle of water - three bucks if you want the big bottle! - LOL

The breakfast buffet was good for being free - I would not spend twenty-four for it!

The staff was nice but disorganized and seemed to be just waking up, even though it was about 9:30 am.

The bellhop was friendly and helpful

The shuttle two and from LAX is great and runs every ten minutes.