Sheraton Kauai Helps Island Regain Mtgs. Market Share
<B> Sheraton Kauai Helps Island Regain Mtgs. Market Share</B>
By Judy Jacobs
The recent reopening of the Sheraton Kauai is just one more major step in getting the island of Kauai back to where it was before Hurricane Iniki struck in September 1992. It's been a long, painful process, and the Garden Isle still is struggling to regain its position in the market place, but the additional rooms supplied by Sheraton should provide a shot in the arm for the destination.
"Some people still think there's something wrong with Kauai, but there isn't anything wrong at all. Every time a new property opens it reinforces the message that everything is okay," said Pattie Herman, director of sales and marketing for the Sheraton Kauai.
The hotel adds 413 rooms to the island, bringing the total inventory back up to about 7,000 rooms. The Sheraton, for the most part, is a new property, after emerging from a $40 million construction and reconstruction project.
"The property has gone through several personalities in its lifetime. For example, once it was a Tower property. Now it has a newly built Beach wing with 70 rooms, all oceanfront accommodations. It also has a new beach pool with a slide and a fitness center," Herman said.
The hotel hopes to get some of the meeting business generated when the new Hawai'i Convention Center opens in June and from the Sheratons in Waikiki.
"We're tying in pre- and post-tours and looking at 50 percent of our business from groups, including meetings. There's a capacity of 5,900 square feet in the main ballroom and breakout rooms," Herman said. "Because of the ballroom size, the maximum we'll be able to accommodate is 500 people for meetings and incentives."
The local travel industry has high expectations for the Sheraton.
"The opening of the Sheraton is the kind of thing that builds excitement and brings attention to the island," said Eric Kloninger of Coopers and Lybrand. "It's another positive development and very much needed, especially since the future status of the two Stouffers and the Coco Palms are still in doubt because of questions of ground leases, insurance payments and ownership."
Regarding the island's post-hurricane status, "Kauai has not recovered from Iniki. In the early years of recovery demand was outpacing supply, then it sort of plateaued," Kloninger said. "Even though there are fewer rooms than there used to be (before Iniki), if demand had remained constant, occupancies would be higher. It could be that with fewer rooms, the island is making less noise in the marketplace."
One development sure to benefit Kauai, as well as the other Neighbor Islands, is the opening of the Hawai'i Convention Center in Honolulu. "A fair amount of business will be pushed to the Neighbor Islands. The boost in business as a result of the convention center will be greater than the boost to Waikiki, since Waikiki traditionally draws high occupancies," Kloninger said
More specifically, he added, "the pre- and post-event, either a meeting or a vacation, will create additional business. It makes sense for pre- and post-meetings to be scheduled on the Neighbor Islands, since they have such good meeting facilities. From the start, in fact, the intent was that the convention center would benefit the Neighbor Islands.