The outlook for the hotel and meetings business continues to shine bright into the new year.
What that means for the 51 properties on this week’s Business Journal list of hotel meeting room space is a seller’s market in which increased business and little new supply have made way for hotels to regain an upper hand in negotiations.
“The reality is that since late 2010, hotels have really been on a very significant upswing, and 2013 was no different,” said Tim Brown, chief executive of Irvine-based Meeting Sites Resource, which offers contract negotiations, events planning and other services. “That’s going to continue.”
The environment is a stark contrast to the period during the recession when meeting planners and corporate clients had the advantage because of low demand and could expect various concessions ranging from free rooms to food and beverage discounts.
“Now that equation has flipped,” Brown said. “But the other interesting thing is that while all this is great for the hotels, companies’ and planners’ meeting budgets remain flat.”
So now there is give-and-take during the negotiations process, he said, because planners are still looking for value.
“[Planners] know it’s a seller’s market, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be proactive in demonstrating value to their clients.”
The lack of dirt being turned is apparent on this week’s list, with indoor meeting space among OC hotels ending the year roughly flat at 1.3 million square feet.
• The Shorebreak Hotel in Huntington Beach notched a three-spot gain to No. 44 due to the addition of 605 square feet of meeting space at the end of last year. The new space is a converted guest room.
“We saw the demand uptick for small business meetings, and we really saw an increase of groups between 15 and 20 looking for U-shaped boardroom-type meetings,” said Shorebreak Director of Sales Enrique Paulo. “We thought it was a space that would convert perfectly for the proposals we saw this year.”
Paulo said that because of the hotel’s beach location, it continues to serve mostly clients in the action-sports industry, such as Huntington Beach-based Quiksilver Inc. and Oakley Inc. of Foothill Ranch. The companies typically utilize Shorebreak’s facilities for executive or regional sales staff meetings.
• Waterfront Beach Resort, a Hilton Hotel property, was the only other hotel to note a change in its total meeting room space. It converted 1,100 square feet of meeting space to build a model room used to show off new suite configurations that would occur with a potential addition to the property on the way, according to Director of Marketing Scott O’Hanlon.
The hotel ranked No. 17, down four spots on the list.
The lack of development activity last year meant the top 10 hotels on the list remained unchanged from last year.
• Hilton Anaheim retained the top spot with 140,000 square feet.
• Disneyland Hotel was close, with 136,000 square feet and the No. 2 spot on the ranking. Disneyland Hotel is part of the Disneyland Resort in Anaheim, which also includes Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel & Spa, No. 22 on the list, and Disney’s Paradise Pier Hotel, No. 20, along with retail and two theme parks.
“It should be a very good year for Disneyland Resort hotels and the meetings industry at large, as booking trends seem to be pointing in the right direction,” said Robert Donahue, director of resort, parks, sales and services at Disneyland Resort. “Part of this growth is due to the return of incentive travel, as core decision makers are recognizing the critical importance to reward and recognize top performers, and no place does that quite like Disneyland Resort.”
Donahue said the three properties’ meeting space offerings, coupled with team-building activities, help sell the resort’s hotels.
“We also offer competitive hotel and ticket packages for attendees who want family or friends to join them pre- or post-event.”
Download the 2014 OC’s LARGEST HOTEL MEETING ROOMS list (pdf)
