Hotel & Motel Management - July 21, 2008 - (Page 21)

www.HotelMotel.com/digital_edition HotelMotel.com | H&MM July 21, 2008 Guest Column fast should open it early enough to accommodate tournament schedules. hmm@questex.com Tom Berkman is g.m. and owner of the THS Co., a sports housing service. He spent 22 years in hotel and restaurant operations before starting THS in 1998. Contact him at Tom@thsweb. 21 Capture the amateur sports business: It’s proﬁtable IN THE details Pros and cons Volume is large, year-round Pay attention to rate quotes Manage the blocks By Tom Berkman H&MM Guest Columnist hotel accordingly, you have a better chance of both getting the booking and ﬁlling your block. Research the local organizations that may run a tournament. The same is true with venues in your city that host a tournament—sometimes they run their own events. If they deal with hotels directly, they always will be interested in work- ing with a hotel that can deliver the things they need, like a rebate (and timely payments) back to the organization, a fair comp policy and rate protection. Offering free meeting space for registration, extra comps and/or reduced staff rooms could lead to your hotel being designated as the ofﬁcial “headquarters” or “staff/ofﬁcials” hotel—and rooms will ﬁll up faster. Some givens about team travel: They will have three to four people in each room, they need double/doubles and they want their rooms close together. Full-service hotels that want to maximize their food-and-beverage revenue should consider a grab-and-go breakfast. Limitedservice hotels with a free break- elcome to the world of amateur sports. These tournaments and competitions are in every corner of the country, in most months of the year. Soccer, baseball—the list is endless. The good news is the volume is huge. The bad news is that, at times, it has inconsistent roomnight pick up, the business is rate-sensitive and the teams sometimes disrupt the stay of your other guests. Here are some ways to help you capture and manage amateur sports business. Sports business will come to a city in one of four ways— through the convention-and-vis- W Sports business will come to a city in one of four ways. KEEP IT SIMPLE. SIMPLY FASTER itors bureau, a sports housing service, a sports organization or a venue. Make sure your hotel is on the CVB lead list. Sports housing services like the THS Co. often are the ﬁrst point of contact a hotel has for a sports lead. If a housing service contacts you, they likely have determined you are in a location that will ﬁll, though it could mean as an overﬂow hotel. Your rate quote should be different if you are within walking distance to the venue versus a 10-mile drive from it. If you price your Systems-built construction is the simple solution for your next commercial construction project. SIMPLY BETTER SIMPLY COST EFFECTIVE ONLINE EXTRA! For more on how to manage amateur sports teams at your hotel, visit www. HotelMotel.com/sports. w.constructionsimpliﬁed.com/hm CIRCLE NO. 127 http://HotelMotel.com http://www.HotelMotel.com/digital_edition http://www.constructionsimplified.com/hm http://www.constructionsimplified.com/hm http://www.HotelMotel.com/sports http://www.HotelMotel.com/sports

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Hotel & Motel Management - July 21, 2008

Contents Larkspur Hotels Branch Out with New Brand Starwood’s C.E.O. Maps Out Journey New Brand Leaders Share Hits, Misses Perspective Letters to the Editor Legal FAQ Training Trends Sales Clinic HotelWorld Update Trends & Stats Special Report: 2008 Construction Companies Survey Guest Column Events Technology: Telephones Hotel Operations: Building Exterior Design: Televisions Transactions Awards Hot Products: Mattresses Supplier News Ad/Edit Index Marketplace Classifieds Checking Out Hotel & Motel Management - July 21, 2008

Hotel & Motel Management - July 21, 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.