Bowl Matchup Has Few Fans

In-state teams not a big draw for hotels

By Tom Stieghorst, Business Writer
Sun Sentinel - Tuesday - Dec 9, 2003

Last season's Orange Bowl game left area hotels flush with dollars imported from the cornfields of Iowa and the beaches of southern California.

Fans of the University of Iowa and the University of Southern California spent freely and stayed for extended trips built around the Jan. 2, 2003 game and the events surrounding the New Year's holiday.

"It was just a great draw," said Kathleen Davis, executive director of the Sport Management Research Institute in Weston.

So when this year's teams were announced over the weekend, some lodging types were unenthusiastic about the pairing. For the first time in the game's 70-year history, two Florida schools will face each other.

Even worse, one of the teams is the hometown University of Miami, which will face Florida State University on Jan. 1 at Pro Player Stadium.

The teams have already played once this year (Miami won Oct. 11 in Tallahassee), and are to open the 2004 college season on Labor Day. That takes away some of the anticipation, Davis said.

Hotels hosted some 40,000 out-of-town visitors last year, but aren't likely to see that repeated. "We're going to be hard-pressed to match last year's economic bump," said Nicki Grossman, president of the Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau.

The game last year generated in the neighborhood of $100 million of economic impact. Efforts to reach several FedEx Orange Bowl officials on Monday to confirm the exact figure were unsuccessful.

But that figure could tumble this year, if a study done for the Tampa Bay Convention & Visitors Bureau is any indication.

The bureau hired a consultant after the University of Florida played in the Outback Bowl this January. The year before, teams from schools in South Carolina and Ohio had traveled to Tampa for the game.

The study found that with one in-state team, hotel room nights declined 18 percent, the average hotel expenditure declined 64 percent and the average restaurant expenditure fell almost 29 percent.

Florida will again play in the Outback Bowl this year, so Tampa will campaign for Gator fans to stay overnight in a hotel rather than make the game a day trip.

South Florida marketers have similar hopes. "We want to drive as much business as we can," said Bill Talbert, president of the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau. Twenty-five area hotels can be booked through the Orange Bowl Internet site, about half in Broward County.

At the Hampton Inn Hallandale Beach-Aventura, bookings were brisk on Monday for the period from Christmas Day through Jan. 4. General manager Tina Kilner said part of that stemmed from Orange Bowl reservations.

A second factor, Kilner said, was the huge winter storm in the Northeast, a traditional source market for South Florida. Bad storms often tip those leaning into action. As a result, rooms for Dec. 25, 27, and 28 are scarce already.

"We're seeing our occupancy go up," Kilner said.