From the way to drive away convention business, this idiot and non believer in free enterprise is trying to block funding for the new 38 floor Hilton

https://www.indystar.com/story/news/politics/2019/03/11/owner-jw-marriott-indianapolis-opposes-proposed-hilton-hotel/3094745002/

That is so frustrating. Indy needs more hotels. Even with the addition of those two new properties the JW will still be plenty full. The more hotels DT the better. The only argument I could see that this hurts would be outlining hotels as there are more options DT. Also I could see with more competition that prices could be driven lower. These are great things for consumers, but I guess not for billionaires.

Won't somebody please think of the billionaires?
[img]https://media1.tenor.com/images/a9e9f448466738b925c1256fddf4aff2/tenor.gif?itemid=7523496[/img]

Its a bad idea to block the competition.

I hope that Gencon makes it clear that continued presence in Indy requires the expansion be approved, both of the convention space and the hotels.

Considering the whole thing where the expected Hilton revenue is already being fantasy-booked for other projects, and there was only one "no" vote when the project passed originally, I would definitely be surprised if anything changed here.  Which is good for us, and, indeed, probably only bad for a handful of property owners.

http://www.insideindianabusiness.com/story/40095962/hotel-convention-center-expansion-sparking-debate

Yeah, this guy thinks there are "way too many" hotel rooms downtown already.....

Let me preface this by saying that I would love more downtown hotels for Gen Con and want it to stay in Indianapolis forever.

However Gen Con is 4 days in early August and these hotels need to fill rooms throughout the entire year to remain profitable. From the Indystar article:

"Hoteliers say the most startling statistic is one of simple math — a fact not contradicted by either survey. If every hotel in the pipeline is built, supply would increase 38 percent by 2025." That is a huge increase that will need to be absorbed by the market throughout the entire year. 

Math doesn't lie and if those rooms cannot be filled by what "Industry leaders consider 70 percent a healthy occupancy" during the entire year they're just not going to survive. Furthermore:

"The firm concluded occupancy citywide would decline from 72 percent today to 65 percent in 2023 after the Hiltons and other hotels in the pipeline open. Occupancy is predicted to rebound to 72 percent by 2026, the study said." Mind you this is the firm sympathetic to the new hotels and "predicted" is a scary thing for a business owner without solid reasons to believe in the predictions. Even if that pans out how would you, as a business owner, like to get hammered for three entire years (best prediction)?

With that said, more rooms and more meeting space/convention square footage absolutely may attract more conventions and larger conventions and may drive those hotel rooms to be filled. Win/win for everyone. 

I really would like for Indianapolis to remain a vibrant convention city and for Gen Con to remain there for the long run. 

I am absolutely a free market kind of guy and win/lose/draw this is free markets at work. Let's all be honest here; as much as we all love and/or hate Gen Con being in Indianapolis as soon as the market turns against that, Gen Con will most definitely choose a more advantageous location. Same goes for building hotels.

Personally I hope they build both of the hotels and it works out for Hilton, for the JW Marriott, and for Indianapolis and for Gen Con.   

Went off on a tangent, but here is an opportunity that all of the business owners in DT Indy should try to come together on. The main point of the following is more DT hotels can attract big time events like the Super Bowl and WrestleMania.

With the current and increasing landscape of Hotels, and how much convention business Indy brings it, I think that Indy should make a push to host WWE WrestleMania sometime soon. Its usually the first week of April. LOS is well big enough to host the actual event. The ICC would be a great space for what they call WrestleMania Access. Its like their big fan experience convention. Plus the basketball arena where they would hold events on Friday, Saturday, Monday, and Tuesday is a block away.

Cities that have hosted recently: Detroit, Orlando, Houston, Glendale, Atlanta, Miami, New York, New Orleans, SF Bay Area, Dallas, Orlando, New York (This Year), Tampa (Next Year).

WWE likes to go to warm destination cities, but I think Indy can point to Detroit as an outlier and say if it can work in Detroit it can work in Indy as well. Mind you the 2008 WM in Detroit (Ford Field) was the 4th highest attended WM in WWE history (80,109). Only outdone by Dallas, New York, and a previous trip to Detroit (Silverdome).

In 2012 Indy hosted the Super Bowl which of course is in February. They had an official Attendance: 68,658. Now cover the field in chairs and block off one end of the Stadium for the stage. Compare that to SB XL in Detroit (Ford Field in 2006 Attendance: 68,206) With very similar SB attendance numbers its easy to say a WM in Indy would do close to 80,000 people.

This is only a one time thing, but could be a huge economic boon. According to Forbes: "WrestleMania 33 generated $181.5 million in economic impact for Central Florida" To compare for 2016 Gen Con: "Visit Indy expects the event to gross over $71 million for the local economy.' Now just take my 10 minutes of research and convince WWE to come to Indy.