The Gulf Coast is on a roll, at least for hoteliers, as few new hotels have opened and demand for the ever-evolving coast has been growing due to a huge, largely BP-financed marketing push following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Coincidence perhaps, but two of its biggest cities, New Orleans and Houston, each had a 10.6 percent increase in rooms sold in the first 11 months of 2012 when compared to the same period in 2011—a far higher percentage increase than any of the country’s other top 25 metro markets, according to Smith Travel Research (STR) figures.
The Texas Gulf Coast has seen meetings-friendly openings on sites housing buildings damaged by hurricanes in 2008. In Galveston a pier that contained a hotel is now a pleasure pier; Beaumont boasts a new event center on the site of a damaged club building; and South Padre Island has a restored hotel that is part of a new waterpark.
Casino expansion continues in Louisiana and Mississippi: Biloxi has a new casino; New Orleans is getting a new casino hotel; Baton Rouge opened a new casino resort; and Lake Charles is getting one.
Florida Gulf growth includes new parks. Pensacola has a new downtown park with a multipurpose stadium; Panama City Beach, a new park amphitheater opening in time for spring; and a downtown riverfront redevelopment under way in Fort Myers, Fla., includes a park expansion.
Although the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill might seem to be the distant past for those outside of the region, BP grants for tourism promotion are still being awarded. In November, in fact, the Mississippi Gulf Coast CVB received $1 million over two years that will be used to promote to winter snowbird markets. And a BP television ad campaign launched in late 2011 promoting Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida is still airing.
LOUISIANA
New Orleans
The 1.1 million-square-foot New Orleans Morial Convention Center at press time was set to unveil a major remodeling in January, highlighted by a new Great Hall with a 60,300-square-foot, divisible ballroom space and a 25,400-square-foot, multiuse prefunction space replacing Hall A.
A new streetcar line connecting the Mercedes-Benz Superdome and the French Quarter is readying to open. Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, which doubled the size of Concourse D, adding six gates in October 2011, is moving forward with projects that comprise its $300 million expansion, which will include a new car rental car facility. And what is perhaps the most high-profile single-day sporting event in the world, Super Bowl XLVII, will be held Feb. 3 at the Superdome, which has undergone an $85 million renovation.
“Everything is getting set, ready for the Super Bowl. Many things are happening. We’ve come really far,” says Kelly Schulz, vice president of communications and public relations at the New Orleans CVB.
With both occupancy and ADR increases for 2012’s first 11 months, the Crescent City had one of the highest revenue per available room (RevPAR) increases among the top 25 U.S. metro areas, according to STR stats, at 15.9 percent. PageBreak
After Hurricane Katrina’s August 2005 devastation, visitor numbers plummeted. Peaking at 10.1 million in 2004, they began climbing back from 3.7 million in 2006. In 2011 they totaled 8.75 million, up 5.6 percent; and for the first half of 2012 they totaled 4.9 million, up 2 percent.
The Big Easy is getting a new casino hotel: Pinnacle Entertainment is set to begin work on a $20 million, 150-room hotel at its Boomtown Casino New Orleans in the Westbank neighborhood (located on the west bank of the Mississippi River). Pinnacle opened the $368 million L’Auberge Casino & Hotel Baton Rouge with a 205-room hotel and a 1,500-seat event center on the Mississippi Sept. 1.
Lake Charles
Pinnacle operates one of three casinos at Lake Charles, off I-10 midway between Houston and New Orleans: the 1,000-room L’Auberge Casino & Hotel. The city also has a downtown civic center with 62,000 square feet of function space.
On a site adjacent to L’Auberge, Ameristar Casinos in July began construction on the 700-room, $560 million Ameristar Casino Resort Spa Lake Charles, slated to open in 2014’s third quarter. (Pinnacle announced in December that it and Ameristar had entered into a definitive agreement under which Pinnacle will acquire all of the outstanding common shares of Ameristar.)
“The Ameristar Casino Resort will further solidify the luxury resort community brand of Southwest Louisiana,” says Megan Hartman, senior marketing manager at the Lake Charles/Southwest Louisiana CVB, adding that in 2012 the CVB “made great strides in increasing bookings,” which were up 4 percent overall.
TEXAS
Beaumont
Sixty miles west of Lake Charles, Beaumont has two major convention facilities: the Beaumont Civic Center Complex downtown, which includes 42,000 square feet of exhibit space and 6,000 square feet of meeting space; and Ford Park Event Center, with a 48,000-square-foot exhibit hall and a 9,000-seat arena.
Beaumont also has two hotels with more than 22,000 square feet of meeting space each: Holiday Inn and MCM Elegante.
“Meetings are booming. Business this past year was solid and 2013 will be another fast, solid year of growth,” says Stephanie Molina, director of marketing for the Beaumont CVB. Meetings and convention business was down slightly in 2011.
Beaumont’s newest meeting facility, the long-awaited $10 million Beaumont Event Centre, opened downtown last July. With 16,000 square feet of indoor space and large canopied outdoor spaces, it replaces the Harvest Club, which was damaged by Hurricane Ike in 2008.
“Our downtown district has undergone a transformation and this is a new option for planners in a hot location,” she says.
Houston/Bay Area
Houston, the nation’s fourth-largest city, has two major convention/trade show facilities, each topping 1 million square feet of space: the George R. Brown Convention Center downtown and Reliant Park, which has a convention center, stadium, arena and the Astrodome.
In December, the Houston City Council gave the go-ahead for a second convention center hotel connected to the Brown Center, a 1,000-room Marriott Marquis, aimed at making the city more competitive. Construction is slated to begin in 2014 for a spring 2016 completion date.
Connected to the Brown Center is the 1,200-room Hilton Americas-Houston, with 91,000 square feet of meeting space. Nearby is the 262-suite Embassy Suites-Houston Downtown with 6,000 square feet of meeting space, which opened in February 2011.
According to STR, Houston had a RevPAR increase of 13.9 percent for the first 11 months of 2012, one of the highest of the country’s top 25 markets—almost as high as New Orleans. The average hotel occupancy increased 9.6 percent to 66.4 percent; ADR rose 3.9 percent to $94.65.
“The business climate in Houston has been very strong and corporate transient occupancy is driving a positive trend,” says John Solis, vice president of sales for the Greater Houston CVB. “We are also significantly up in room nights due to larger city-wide conventions scheduled for 2013.” PageBreak
Galveston
With 32 miles of beaches 50 miles from Houston, Galveston has two major convention facilities: the 140,000-square-foot Galveston Island Convention Center at the San Luis Resort, which last May increased bandwidth and access points, and Moody Gardens Hotel, Spa and Convention Center, with 100,000 square feet of available space.
“Galveston experienced its best peak tourism season on record in 2012, with a 10.5 percent increase in hotel occupancy tax revenue over 2011’s peak season, and record attendance at the island’s beaches. We are forecasting that this positive trend will continue,” says Meg Winchester, director of the Galveston Island CVB. “Meetings and convention business is ahead, and with the amount of short-term bookings we are seeing, we look forward to another great year.”
The $60 million Galveston Island Historic Pleasure Pier opened last May, and features restaurants, retail and 16 rides, and replaced the former Flagship Hotel destroyed by Hurricane Ike in 2008.
Three new hotels are opening this year: a Courtyard by Marriott and an adjacent TownePlace Suites along Seawall Boulevard in March, and a Days Inn in June.
Corpus Christi
Corpus Christi serves up the American Bank Center with 500,000 square feet of event space.
Nearby is Whataburger Field, home to the Corpus Christi Hooks, a Houston Astros Double-A affiliate. Adjacent to the field, Hurricane Alley Waterpark was unveiled last May and includes a 12,000-square-foot wave pool, a six-story slide complex, a four-lane racer slide and three event spaces for groups of up 200.
Two other major tourist magnets also added new attractions last May. Texas State Aquarium, which can take groups of up to 3,000, opened a new 10,000-gallon interactive exhibit, Stingray Lagoon, and the USS Lexington Museum, a WWII carrier that can take 2,600 for hangar-deck functions, opened the 193-seat 3D Mega Theater.
The new 103-room Hyatt Place Corpus Christi on South Padre Island Drive was taking reservations for dates from March. 1.
Also, Schlitterbahn Waterparks was about to start work on a hotel/waterpark/golf development expected to open in March 2014 on Padre Island. Last May, the city approved a $117 million incentive package for the project.
South Padre Island
The new Schlitterbahn Beach Resort opened last summer on South Padre Island. It is composed of a new 80,000-square-foot indoor waterpark; an existing 26-acre Schlitterbahn outdoor waterpark; and a 221-room hotel. The hotel is the existing renovated South Padre Beach Resort, which has been closed since damaged by Hurricane Dolly in 2008.
A barrier island 34 miles long, South Padre Island has a dozen meetings-equipped hotels and resorts, along with 4,000 hotel/condo rooms. Its primary venue, the South Padre Island Convention Center, has a 22,000-square-foot exhibit hall, a 250-seat auditorium and 9,000 square feet of meeting rooms.
MISSISSIPPI
Mississippi Gulf Coast
Centered on Biloxi and Gulfport, and with 26 miles of beaches, Harrison County has nine of the coast’s 11 casinos; Hancock County to the west has the other two. Nine of the 12 casinos have hotels, which account for 5,500 of the coast’s almost 13,000 rooms.
Biloxi’s Mississippi Coast Coliseum & Convention Center almost doubled in size in 2010, increasing rentable space to 413,000 square feet and taking groups of up to 6,000, compared to 2,500 previously.
According to Crystal Johnson, director of sales at the Mississippi Gulf Coast CVB, tourism numbers for 2012 compared to 2011 remained steady.
“Meetings and conventions business seems to be picking up year over year,” she says, adding that the number of guest rooms and meeting space options are still lower than they were before 2005’s Katrina.
However, last May the coast welcomed its 12th casino—the new $62 million Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville Casino & Restaurant Biloxi—bringing its number of casinos back to the pre-Katrina level.
In November, Landry’s Inc. purchased Biloxi’s Isle Casino Hotel and is proceeding with a $150 million renovation and plans to rebrand it Golden Nugget Biloxi.
At NASA Stennis Space Center in Hancock County, the new $30 million, 67,000-square-foot Infinity Science Center opened last April, replacing its StenniSphere visitor center. The coast has also seen growth with the expansion of the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum of Art, and a $10.5 million presidential library at Beauvoir, home of Jefferson Davis, is expected to open soon.
The 10th Home2 Suites by Hilton in the U.S., the 100-suite Home2 Suites Biloxi North/D’Iberville, which has meeting space, opened in June. PageBreak
ALABAMA
Mobile
Mobile Bay CVB promotes the waterfront 317,000-square-foot Outlaw Convention Center, which is surrounded by over 1,100 hotel rooms.
Mobile recently underwent a rebranding with the new tag, “Secretly Awesome,” and has a new website at www.mobile.org.
“The single most prevalent challenge to Mobile is that it remains a relative unknown, especially being situated between New Orleans and some of the country’s most beautiful beaches,” says Stacy Hamilton, Mobile Bay CVB vice president of marketing and communications.
According to Hamilton, first-time visitors often have no idea what to expect, “yet we have amazing things to offer both leisure travelers and groups. It was from here that we began to develop a new tourism brand,” she says.
Slated to open this fall at Mobile Landing is the city’s long-awaited, $58 million, 90,000-square-foot GulfQuest, the National Maritime Museum of the Gulf of Mexico. Mobile Landing includes the convention center, cruise terminal, and a riverside park/amphitheater.
Alabama Gulf Coast
To the southeast of Mobile are 30 miles of beaches with 11 meetings-equipped hotels on an island that includes the cities of Gulf Shores and Orange Beach. The city of Orange Beach has the Conference Center at The Wharf, opened in 2009 and later acquired by the city, which offers 27,000 square feet of meeting/exhibit space.
“We are up significantly in the meetings market,” says Beth Gendler, vice president of sales at Gulf Shores & Orange Beach Tourism. “We are a hot destination that is family and meeting planner friendly with some real value times during the off-season—think spring and fall for wonderful weather and great rates.”
The newest hotel, Orange Beach’s Hampton Inn & Suites, opened with 5,000 square feet of meeting space in 2011. This spring, Island House Hotel is opening a 5,000-square-foot ballroom.
FLORIDA
Pensacola
Pensacola’s market area includes its beach, which offers nine hotels with 1,000-plus rooms and 20,000 square feet of meeting space, and also a downtown civic center.
Last April, the city opened its 30-acre, $50 million Maritime Park, located downtown overlooking Pensacola Bay. It features a multiuse stadium, home to the Pensacola Blue Wahoos (a Double-A affiliate of the Cincinnati Reds), an amphitheater and festival grounds.
July saw the debut of 360 Pensacola Beach, an observation wheel with 42 climate-controlled gondolas, each holding six people.
A 127-room Hyatt Place is expected to open in March as part of a 12-acre office and retail development at Pensacola International Airport, formerly called Pensacola-Gulf Coast Regional Airport until renamed in late 2011.
Emerald Coast
To the east, the Emerald Coast of Okaloosa County has 24 miles of beach and the communities of Destin, Fort Walton Beach and Okaloosa Island. Fort Walton Beach is home to the Emerald Coast Convention Center, with 35,000 square feet of meeting/exhibit space and a dozen hotels with meeting space.
A November groundbreaking was held for the $25 million, 152-room Holiday Inn Resort, Destin West, on land leased from Eglin Air Force Base. And Holiday Inn Destin on the Beach, closed in October for renovation, is slated to reopen in May. PageBreak
Beaches of South Walton
Farther east are the 26 miles of the Beaches of South Walton, with 15 communities.
The area is home to the 2,400-acre Sandestin Golf and Beach Resort, which includes two Marriott-branded properties and 65,000 square feet of meeting space. In a $2 million transformation of the former Bayside Inn, the resort opened the LeCiel boutique hotel last May.
Also located at the resort is 598-room Hilton Sandestin Beach Golf Resort & Spa, which was spending most of a $5 million winter renovation on its 32,000 square feet of indoor meeting space, ready for a January unveiling.
Panama City Beach
Panama City Beach has 27 miles of beaches, 21,000 hotel and condo units, and 160,000 square feet of meeting space. Major meetings hotels include Edgewater Beach & Golf Resort, Boardwalk Beach Resort & Conference Center, and Wyndham Bay Point Resort, each with between 32,000 and 40,000 square feet of meeting space.
According to Ann Gager, Panama City Beach CVB director of sales, bed tax collections were up 12 percent in Florida’s last fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30, following a 20 percent increase in 2011
“Accessibility to PCB with the new airport continues to put the destination in the limelight with meeting planners,” she says, advising that planners should capitalize on the shoulder season from August to May.
Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport opened in May 2010, attracting a new carrier, Southwest, and replacing Panama City-Bay County International Airport.
Nearing completion, a $2.6 million, 7,500-seat amphitheater will open at Aaron Bessant Park in time for a spring concert series. Also, the 2,900-acre Panama City Beach Conservation Park opened in October 2011 with eight boardwalks and 24 miles of trails.
Tampa/St. Petersburg
Tampa hosted the Republican National Convention in late August, attracting 50,000 visitors, and plenty of accolades.
“I’ve never been prouder of Tampa,” announced Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn. “We hosted a great event while the world’s eyes were on us, and the thousands of visitors left seeing the best we have to offer. This was our time to shine, and we rose to the occasion.”
The Tampa-St. Petersburg area had average hotel occupancy of 64 percent for the first 11 months of 2012, up from 61.3 percent for the 2011 period, at an ADR of $101.05, up from $94.36. This resulted in a RevPAR increase of 11.9 percent. The number of rooms on the market was flat.
Tampa’s downtown waterfront boasts the 650,000-square-foot Tampa Convention Center and 2,100 rooms in a four-block radius. PageBreak
Fort Myers
The Beaches of Fort Myers & Sanibel in southwest Florida includes such areas as Fort Myers, Sanibel Island, Captiva Island, Fort Myers Beach and Bonita Springs.
The $150 million Downtown Fort Myers Riverfront Redevelopment is under way, aimed at the reconnecting the historic district to the Caloosahatchee River. A $5.3 million first phase of water basin improvements was completed in December.
The plan includes a 200-room convention hotel and an 80,000-square-foot addition to the Harborside Event Center, which currently includes a 30,000-square-foot Great Hall. It also includes 100,000 square feet of restaurant/retail, yacht basin expansion and a four-acre addition, including an amphitheater, to the existing 10-acre Centennial Park.
“We saw growth in both occupancy and ADR during 2012—overall with greater growth in occupancy than ADR—which means the Fort Myers/Sanibel Island area continues to be a great value for meeting planners,” says Tamara Piggott, executive director of the Lee County VCB.
For the 2011-2012 fiscal year that ended Sept. 20, Lee County’s bed tax reached a record-breaking $26.5 million, a 9.2 percent increase over the previous 12 months.
“Our international marketing efforts to draw visitors to Lee County are more successful than ever and continue to make tourism the cornerstone of our local economy,” she explains.
In Bonita Springs, the 454-room Hyatt Regency Coconut Point Resort and Spa in late 2012 completed a $14.5 million room renovation. The 263-room Resort at Marina Village became the Westin Cape Coral Resort at Marina Village in December.
The area, including Naples to the south, is served by Southwest Florida International Airport, which has 19 carriers and serves 41 nonstop destinations.
Naples
Collier County and its 30 miles of beaches, including the cities of Naples and Marco Island and Everglades City, are dubbed the Paradise Coast.
The Greater Naples, Marco Island & Everglades CVB reports that tourist development tax collections for the fiscal year 2011/2012 that ended Sept. 30 set an all-time record, totaling $14.9 million; the previous record of $14.8 million was set in 2007/2008. However, the CVB finds that hotel ADR had not fully recovered to the levels seen in 2008.
According to Jack Wert, executive director of the CVB, the record-setting tourist tax revenue reflects a newfound confidence among visitors.
“We see corresponding increases in the number of visitors and in overall spending in the community,” he says.
In downtown Naples, the Inn on Fifth recently completed a $18 million expansion, adding 32 club level suites to its existing 87 rooms, which have been renovated, in a new building across Fifth Avenue. It also has a new 1,000-square-foot board room, increasing the Inn’s meeting space to nearly 9,000 square feet.
Also, the 317-room Naples Beach Hotel & Golf Club recently completed its latest renovation phase, spending $5 million that included opening a new 5,000-square-foot ballroom. All rooms have been renovated over the past three years.
Tony Bartlett has been covering the hospitality industry for more than 20 years.
