CIAA possibly leaving Charlotte (Raleigh, Winston-Salem: sales, 2013, hotels)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Apparently there aren't enough hotel rooms for the CIAA's likings.
The Observer version of the article tells more of the story. It looks like the CIAA would like the local hotels to lower their rates so attendees will have more money to spend on tickets and other 'necessities'. An earlier version of the article mentioned that the tournament may look at Winston-Salem next year.
Do they have more hotel rooms in Winston-Salem than Charlotte? Well, lots of luck with that and don't let the door hit you on the way out.
She says that she would like more rooms Uptown reserved for the event, not that there is not enough room.....we accommodated 61,000 for the DNC. The CIAA brings 46,000.
So the CIAA wants Charlotte to built more hotels for just the period of the games? What about the rest of the year?
The two new Uptown hotels are good news, but I doubt Charlotte will built hotels just to keep them here. Winston most definitely doesn't have more hotels than Uptown or Charlotte itself.
"In addition to more hotel space uptown, she’d like to see room rates come down for fans who must sometimes decide between paying for a hotel and buying a ticket to a game – especially since ticket sales are one of the main ways the CIAA makes money.
Although willing to negotiate, Smith said that might be hard because rates have increased along with occupancy rates as the industry has rebounded since the recession. "
So a business who provides a service (the hotel) should cut into their profits or operate at a loss because someone else (the CIAA) isn't making enough money.
So she doesn't want to move to a city with BETTER/MORE hotel accommodations, she wants to move to a city with CHEAPER hotel accommodations.
Well, so long.
IMO, this is a tactic to get more money out of the Charlotte taxpayers when they renegotiate with the city to keep bringing the event here. This, from an organization, where the media is reporting they will sue a business for referring to them by name.
My prediction: The idiots running the city will take the bait and give them more money.
^^^It seems to me that Charlotte's CIAA performance has been outstanding; so outstanding that the party has begun to overshawdow the basketball (kinda like Speedstreet often overshadows the race). A move back to a city like Winston (Winston did host this event years ago, as did Raleigh) could tone down the party and place the focus back onto selling basketball tickets.
I tend to agree with Frewroad on this one. If Charlotte doesn't kick in an extra $500k during the next bid (to help cover the CIAA's debt), we can kiss this event goodbye. I don't want to see tax dollars going to the CIAA. However, I would like to see sponsors such as BofA, Belks, Family Dollar, SPX, Piedmont Natural Gas, Food Lion, Lowes, Duke Energy etc step up and help out these schools. This event has been good for Charlotte, so I don't see why our local companies can't get together and cut these schools a check. The CIAA needs only a fraction of what Jerry Richardson's bank heist total will be.
It's probably in the CIAA's best interest to rotate host cities every so often. Otherwise the locals get compacent and think they can milk the cash cow for parking, drink prices, room rates, etc.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
