Re: Hotel situation for FOSS4GNA - thought you should know

[David William Bitner]

Michael (adding the LOC list here too),

Thanks for the heads up on the Marriott. We only received a small block of rooms. Part of our negotiation with the Marriott was that we did not want any room block liability, so we were only able to pick up what rooms/rate they provided us as a "Courtesy Room Block". This has been a major issue and the source of 10's of thousands of dollars in liability after the conference for other conference organizers (FOSS4G and others) that we talked to when negotiating with the venue.

LOC folks --- in light of the Marriott filling up, is there anyone willing to do a bit of research and come up with a list of hotels (we don't need arrangements with them) that are either near the venue or near the light rail (even a few Bloomington by MOA would be good). If someone could get some content together, I can get that pasted and updated on the website. Ideally, it'd be great if someone could call some of these hotels and check on receiving 1) A "Courtesy Room Block" (I believe that is the industry jargon for a room block without liability) and 2) whether the hotel accepts government rate for gov folks.

--bit

On Fri, Apr 12, 2013 at 6:22 AM, Michael Terner <m...@appgeo.com> wrote:

David et al:

Just a quick note on the hotel situation as I ran into a minor issue in making my reservations earlier this week. The entire Marriott is booked full, including the conference block on Tuesday night, 5/21. This is causing me to need to book at a different hotel for Tuesday night, and then move to the Marriott on Weds-Thurs. This seems a little odd, was the conference block in place and/or smaller for Tuesday night? I dont know what the contract was, but I'm sure others will have the same situation (since we're still hoping there are >100 yet to register). As I said it's manageable for me with the minor hassle of moving places on Weds.



Could be worth a notice on the web-site, with a pointer to other hotels? Im booked at the Holiday Inn Express for a similar price to the Marriott's conference rate (and it's a 10 minute walk to the conf venue). I would assume that many out of towners will arrive on Tuesday as I am...



Your call on if this warrants any attention...



MT

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David William Bitner

dbSpatial LLC

612-424-9932

[Steve Swazee]

Rather than reinvent to wheel, may I suggest posting a link to this site: http://www.minneapolis.org/visitor/hotels

 

I’ve worked with the folks at Convention Bureau before and I’ll bet that would be willing to do the detail leg work on this one.  Here is the contact information: http://www.minneapolis.org/meeting-and-event-professional/general/sales-contact-directory

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[David William Bitner]

Great thought and links Steve.

I'd still like to ask for someone to take point on this. Anyone?

[Blaine Hackett]

We have a contact already established from our work with them last summer so I can call.

Best Regards,

 

Blaine Hackett

President | Flat Rock Geographics

651-303-8490 | bla...@flatrockgeo.com

www.flatrockgeo.com | twitter.com/flatrockgeo

[Blaine Hackett]

Hey guys,

Just wanted to clarify this.  So, we had the block of rooms with the Courtesy status.  Dave and I understood they could be rented out from under us but you would think that the Marriot would have had the "courtesy" to let us know that.

Dave, I don't think Katie is there any more.  Who was your last contact over there??  I am going to call and jack them up for this.  Maybe they can work with the Radisson to get us a deal.  

Blaine

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