Meeting space increased slightly at Orange County’s largest hotels last year on the strength of new hotels and some renovations.
The county’s 50 largest hotels in terms of permanent indoor meeting space reported a 2.8% increase in meeting space to 1.2 million square feet, according to this week’s Business Journal list.
Three hotels added space, one lost square footage and two were newcomers.
The increase in space adds to the competition for convention business here just as the recession is causing some softening in the number of meetings held at hotels.
Disneyland Hotel retained its longstanding hold on the No. 1 spot with 136,000 square feet of space. The 45-year-old hotel will undergo a guest room renovation this year.
The hotel benefits from two nearby Disney hotels, No. 23 Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel & Spa and No. 19 Disney’s Paradise Pier Hotel. The three hotels being so close together make up an important part of the city’s meetings market, according to Robert Donahue, director of groups and conventions for the Disneyland Resort.
“(Meeting) planners are looking for value,” he said.
The Disneyland Resort hotels offer reservation technology, free shuttle services and automatic check-in for groups, among other things, Donahue said.
Grand Californian is on track to complete an expansion that will add 203 guest rooms and 50 Disney Vacation Club timeshare suites by next year.
Top 10 Hotels
Hilton Anaheim, the county’s largest hotel by rooms, held its No. 2 ranking on the list with 100,000 square feet of meeting space.
The hotel put the finishing touches on its $60 million renovation in time for the first conventions of 2009 with the opening of Mix restaurant and The Health Club at Hilton Anaheim, a 25,000-square-foot fitness facility.
“Because we’re a convention hotel, 2009 is shaping up to be better than the last couple of years in group room nights,” said Brad Logsdon, director of sales and marketing.
Anaheim Marriott continued its hold on the No. 3 slot with 80,768 square feet of space.
The hotel’s director of sales and marketing, Steve Pufpaf, said Anaheim Marriott has strong first-quarter convention business, but still is looking at some cost-cutting measures.
Two coastal resorts, Island Hotel in Newport Beach and the St. Regis Resort, tied for No. 8. The Ritz-Carlton, Laguna Niguel in Dana Point came in at No. 10.
In all, the top 10 hotels account for half of the meeting space on the list.
Hotels often add and subtract small amounts of meeting space as demands change. The Radisson Newport Beach, which jumped to No. 18 from No. 26 due to previously excluded space, was one of the few hotels on the list that moved up in ranking.
No. 31 Montage Laguna Beach added 2,000 square feet of meeting space, but still dropped a notch on the list due to the debut of No. 27 Resort at Pelican Hill.
“We added four hospitality suites for 12 to 30 people with outdoor views,” said James Bermingham, general manager of Montage.
Dropping a few spots were the Hilton Irvine, which dropped to No. 25 from No. 15 because of prior inclusion of some outdoor space, and No. 43 Embassy Suites Anaheim North, which dropped three spots after reducing its meeting space by just 600 square feet.
New to the list this year: Resort at Pelican Hill in Newport Coast with 18,000 square feet of indoor space; and Sheraton Garden Grove Anaheim South at No. 40 with 9,500 square feet of space.
Pelican Hill director of group and incentive sales Nance Trevithick said the resort, which opened in November, is going after corporate and incentive business.
“The meetings that have booked with the resort range from executive board meetings to sales incentives for industries that include manufacturing, retail, healthcare, consulting and engineering,” Trevithick said.
The Sheraton opened last July adjacent to the Anaheim Resort District. General manager Phil Wolfgramm said the hotel is seeking corporate business to supplement weddings and other social events the hotel already is booking.
A Homecoming
Returning to the list this year at No. 48 is the Red Lion Hotel Anaheim, formerly the Radisson Maingate. The Radisson dropped off the list in 2005 as new hotels with more meeting space opened. The Red Lion added about 1,400 square feet of meeting space during an ongoing renovation after it bought the hotel last year, bringing its new total to 7,096 square feet.
The renovation will be complete in February, according to sales director Marlena Nelson.
Three hotels were bumped off the list due to the newcomers: the Jolly Roger in Anaheim, the Wyndham at Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa and Aliso Creek Inn at Laguna Beach.
The Jolly Roger is scheduled to close so owner Newport Beach-based Tarsadia Hotels can build two Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide projects on the land. Aliso Creek Inn is owned by Montage Resort and Spa, which plans to makeover the property,which could put the inn back on the list in the future.
City Breakdown
Anaheim, the hub of the county’s convention market, has the most hotel meeting space among OC cities with more than 444,000 square feet of space in 12 hotels on the list. That’s 37% of the total space among the largest 50 hotels.
Newport Beach ranks second among OC cities with seven hotels (including Resort at Pelican Hill) and 13% of the total with 154,141 square feet of space.
Garden Grove’s five hotels, with about 114,000 square feet of space, make it the No. 3 rank among OC’s cities.
Rounding out the top five cities are Irvine, with five hotels and 101,686 square feet of meeting space; and Dana Point, with four hotels and 90,214 square feet of space.
In all, 14 OC cities are represented on the list.
Meetings are naturally an important component for the hotels on this list, so it’s no surprise that 48 of them have a business center and 47 have an onsite meeting coordinator for groups.
A newer addition that’s a nod to meeting attendees increasingly dependent on complex technology: 40 hotels on the list now have onsite technology assistance available.
