SDCC’s Nightmare Hotel Situation Could Push Comic-Con Out of San Diego

Even if you’ve ne'er attended San Diego Comic-Con, you’ve astir apt heard how hard it is to get a edifice for the event. Every twelvemonth fans participate an online lottery that’s agelong been dubbed “Hotelpocalypse” hoping to get a room adjacent to the con astatine a tenable price. However, successful caller years, galore fans—including the unit of this precise website—have recovered the lottery progressively difficult. Now, we whitethorn cognize why, and Comic-Con isn’t blessed astir it.

Speaking to Forbes.com, David Glanzer, Chief Communication and Strategy Officer for Comic-Con International, said that respective hotels successful the country person made less rooms disposable during the online lottery—which features pre-negotiated rates—knowing they tin get guests to publication rooms directly, extracurricular the lottery, astatine a greatly accrued rate. “Many of the hotels downtown person been incredibly fantastic to us,” Glanzer said. “They’ve allowed america to usage gathering space, they’ve fixed america immense country blocks, they’ve kept their rates precise competitive. But it’s pugnacious erstwhile those hotels connection a competitory complaint and past a edifice that chooses not to beryllium successful the country artifact charges an exorbitant magnitude of money. That means the radical who enactment with america extremity up losing out.”

Here’s an example. Comic-Con is presently 2 weeks distant and, you’d assume, each hotels would beryllium wholly sold out. Well, arsenic of 9 a.m. PT connected Wednesday, July 10, a hunt for a one-person country from July 24-July 28 didn’t crook up galore results, but it did crook up some. If you publication today, rates successful the contiguous downtown country scope from $548 a nighttime to $1,184 a night. That higher fig is astatine the Hilton San Diego Gaslamp Quarter which, during the lottery, charges lone $326 per night. The astir costly edifice successful the full lottery is $420 per night.

“If attendees opt not to travel due to the fact that they can’t spend to enactment astatine a edifice here, they’ll spell to different convention,” Glanzer continues. “And if that starts to happen, the studios won’t beryllium capable to marque arsenic large an impact, and it becomes a downward spiral that nary 1 wants to spell down. If we can’t accommodate the radical who privation to be the amusement past we’re successful a beauteous atrocious situation.”

Comic-Con’s lease with the San Diego Convention Center ends successful 2025 and Glanzer thinks, if this signifier continues, the normal whitethorn person to earnestly look into relocating. “We would ne'er want to leave, but if propulsion came to shove and it became untenable for us, it’s thing that we would surely person to look into,” helium said. “As lawsuit planners, we’re ever contacted by antithetic cities and it would beryllium reckless for america to not astatine slightest admit that.”

Read much astir the concern implicit astatine Forbes.com and, if determination are immoderate large updates, we’ll fto you cognize here. For present though, San Diego Comic-Con is afloat steam up for 2024 and io9 volition beryllium connected the ground. Check backmost for sum starting adjacent week.

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