Millennium Forecast For Vancouver Looking Bright
<B> Millennium Forecast For Vancouver Looking Bright</B>
By Judy Williams
For the first time in more than a decade, Vancouver is experiencing a buyer's market, and industry insiders are expecting the trend to continue as several recent developments--including an anticipated 5,000 guest rooms to be added to the inventory by 2003--and a weakened local economy have directly impacted the city's market shift.
Like most international destinations, Vancouver too has felt the touch of the Asian flu, which brought 17.1 percent less visitors from Asia/Pacific in the period from January to October 1998. But such was not the case nearly 15 years ago, when Expo '86 brought international exposure and record numbers of visitors to Vancouver, causing occupancy and room rates to soar. Then, with an exceptionally strong Asian business and conventions market, and a currency attractive to international travelers, a seller's market increased to the point of diminishing returns.
"Over the past five years, we haven't even looked at Vancouver," admitted Sheila Barnes, account manager for American Express Group Travel Management Services in Ontario.
"When we first started bringing our group to Vancouver in 1985, the city was a 'Best-Buy' value," said Dr. Everett Rigsbee, executive secretary of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Project 802. "Unfortunately, success began to spoil the city. Hotels were telling us they didn't really want our business during high season and although we shifted our meeting dates to the shoulder season, we eventually received the same message." So Rigsbee's group moved their annual meeting elsewhere "until the city's prices came back to reality" in 1998, when Vancouver began to demonstrate a subtle shift from a seller's to a buyer's market. Finding a room during May and June was nearly impossible until then.
"The past few years have not been as successful as what the city has enjoyed in years past," said Ruy Paes-Braga, vice president and general manager of Four Seasons Hotel in Vancouver. The city still is feeling the pinch of the Asian flu and is facing government issue problems in lowering room rates to compete in a buyer's market.
Within North America, Paes-Braga said, Vancouver has probably the highest operational costs--especially labor--which directly impacts a hotel's ability to lower prices. Lowered occupancy levels will not generally affect the rates because hotels simply cannot afford to keep rates down to cover costs.
To accommodate the anticipated influx of business travelers, Vancouver this year has opened two new hotels. The Sheraton Suites Le Soleil in March opened its doors in the heart of the business district, with 122 suites offering all the typical in-room business amenities.
The Westin Grand Vancouver opened in April, presenting itself as a non-traditional hotel experience. Located in Vancouver's entertainment district, the Westin has 207 suites and six meeting rooms.
In addition to the growth in hotel capacity, the Vancouver Convention & Exhibition Center will expand as well. A 250,000-sq.-ft. exhibit hall, 50,000-sq.-ft. ballroom, 1,500-seat tiered lecture theater and 82,000 square feet of meeting space will be added to increase the city's ability to compete on a larger scale against many U.S. cities.
While the convention center still is undergoing contractual negotiations, agreements likely will be signed this summer. Scheduled for completion by 2003, the existing center will remain fully functional throughout the process, and will offer about three times the space of the original center.