SEMA on a Hotel Budget

Diane Taylor -- Tradeshow Week, 11/14/2008 1:39:00 PM

With exhibitors and attendees scrambling to pay for trips to tradeshows and hotel rates dropping in Las Vegas every day, show managers have decided to take action.

The Specialty Equipment Marketing Association, which draws more than 120,000 attendees to its SEMA Show, held Nov. 4-7 at the Las Vegas Convention Center, offered discounted rates or hotel “extras” before the event to attract customers.

ConvExx Executive Show Manager Chuck Schwartz wouldn’t comment on how many SEMA attendees took advantage of the hotel discounts and other offers, but noted that overall he is “ecstatic” at the room pickup at SEMA’s 40 hotels.

Experient Vice President of Strategic Accounts Robert Colvin said that hotel rates are negotiated a year or more in advance, with his company watching the hotel and travel Web sites to see that the negotiated rates are not being underpriced.

“We may miss one or two, but we’re on top of most price adjustments,” he added. “At SEMA, the final rate reductions were made within a week of the cutoff. We then went back and made sure everyone else who had preregistered got the new prices; it isn’t a small process to adjust rates that late, but SEMA and the customers benefit.”

For exhibitors and attendees at SEMA, budgets were definitely a consideration when deciding where to stay during the show. 

Harold Hanks of BD Diesel Performance was part of a group of six who rented a house, rather than stay at a hotel. “This show is a necessity for us, but it is expensive, so we save where we can,” he added.  

Others, such as Dan Colton, owner of a body shop in Boise, Idaho, were lucky enough to take advantage of the discounted rates. Colton said he switched his room reservation to the Excalibur Hotel-Casino-Las Vegas after receiving information from SEMA mentioning a change in hotel rates. “The lower rates help us out, especially now,” he added.

Intl. CES announced that it, too, will offer discounts on some of its hotel rates for its Jan. 8-11 mega-show. Intl. CES’ Manager of Operations Noelle Williams said, “We have made affordable hotel rooms in Las Vegas a priority over the past few years. Now what we are seeing is a combination of forces. Some hotels are proactively reducing their hotel rates for CES, and some, when we have asked them to revisit rates, are dropping them accordingly. Other hotels have chosen to keep the rates as is.”