'NO VACANCY': Hotels fill up in wake of storm

Elliott joined the vast number of southwest Missourians who sought heat and light at area hotel properties. Hotels have been flashing the “no vacancy” sign since the ice hit Jan. 12.

At the peak of outages, City Utilities reported that 75,000 customers were without power. By contrast, the city only has about 6,000 hotel rooms, according to the Springfield Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Factor in the out-of-town recovery workers who needed rooms, and the demand on hotels has been high.

Even more than a week after the storm has faded and with about 5,900 CU customers still in the dark as of Jan. 25. CVB reported less than 100 available hotel rooms citywide.

Historic? Unprecedented?

For January it is.

“Unfortunately, I guess, when things like this happen, it does tend to be good for the hotel industry,” said CVB Public Relations Manager Susan Wade, who said her office wouldn’t have citywide revenue estimates from the hotel/motel tax calculated until March.

Wade said all hotels have been “at or near capacity” since the storm.

Elliott said that so many customers came to his Arbor Suites, 1550 E. Raynell Place, that he and his employees “had to go to emergency procedures.”

“It was chaotic,” said Elliott, who also lodged at Arbor Suites.

That meant allowing dogs, not asking about smoking preferences, loosened employee dress code and not answering the phone. Customers could only get rooms on a first-come, first serve basis, he said.

Arbor Suites never lost power, but Elliott’s other six Springfield hotels lost power for at least a day.

Since regaining power, all of Elliott Lodging’s properties have been booked. The normal occupancy rate at this time of year is about 40 percent, Elliott said.

Not all good

Missy Handyside, sales director for Clarion Hotel, 3333 S. Glenstone Ave., said her hotel/convention center took a $90,000 loss from the storm weekend.

She said Clarion lost power for four days, all of which were slated to be fully booked with various groups, including high school basketball teams for the Bass Pro Shops Tournament of Champions.

Handyside’s hotel sent booked teams to other hotels and had to cancel a breakfast for the tournament.

It also lost revenue from Classic Sports, a restaurant/bar that should have been busy because of the National Football League playoffs.

Though Clarion has been sold out since regaining power, Handyside said it wouldn’t recover most of its lost revenues.

“I don’t want the community to think it was great for the hotels,” she said. “We did everything we could to pull together and help.”

Handyside, who is president of the Springfield Hotel Motel Association, said she’s not aware of price gouging, but Missouri Attorney General Jay Nixon reported complaints of price gouging from the Joplin-to-Lebanon Interstate 44 corridor. According to a Jan. 19 news release, Nixon had received complaints of hotels charging $50 to $75 more than normal rates.

Summer ice

While the sell-outs are unprecedented in January, they aren’t unprecedented overall for Springfield.

Elliott, Handyside and Wade all said large conventions regularly keep hotel rooms booked in summer and fall months.

“It’s hard to beat July, but its almost going to be a July,” Elliott said. “It’s a summer month in the middle of winter.

“I’m not sure that we can get real excited about what everybody had to go through, but we’re just really glad that we could help keep people out of the cold.”

City Utilities’ Concentration

City Utilities spokesman Ern DeCamp said CU crews focused on hotels without power in the immediate aftermath of the Jan. 12 ice storm. CU looked for hotels that could be easily restored with power and that could house 50 or more out-of-town recovery workers. After the first few days of recovery, CU no longer concentrated on hotels, DeCamp said.[[In-content Ad]]