As we warned you, it became possible at 9 AM this morn to book online hotel reservations for this year's Comic-Con International through their website. I haven't monitored the activity but others are reporting that by Noon, all the main hotels were sold out and the remaining rooms were off in distant zip codes. More rooms will become available later (especially around June 8, which is when credit cards are charged) but the scramble is on, and many will find no room at the inn.
This year, the convention rates for a single at the Hilton, Marriott or Hyatt hotels that are within walking distance of the convention center range from $175 to $219 a night, and they're sold out of those. A lot of people have already booked at those and other hotels without going through the convention even though that means a higher pricetag. Lodging near a convention center is usually contracted under a promotional arrangement designed to encourage conventions to come to town and give them loads of business. Each hotel will commit to making X% of their rooms available at a convention rate, then they'll sell the rest at higher prices — whatever price they can get. The convention rate for the Westin Horton Plaza, which is six blocks from the convention center, is $160 per night and I think they're sold out, too. Some online hotel bookers are currently saying they can get you in there for $465 a night and we can only guess what they'll charge for any rooms that become available in late June.
This, of course, creates a powerful financial incentive for the hotels to keep that X% as low as possible. The more rooms they don't make available via the convention plan, the more they can get for them. In future years, we may see fewer and fewer rooms available at a convention rate, and there's really nothing anyone can do about that.
It's rather amazing, in a way. I've been attending comic book conventions since 1970, the year of the first one in San Diego. I've gone to them all across America and recall a time when many hotels didn't want them and the ones that did take them were hesitant and treated us like a second-class booking. We were a young, non-spending crowd. We didn't come in with lavish expense accounts and run up huge bar tabs. We didn't book huge banquets or cocktail parties or take the higher-priced suites. We were a little rowdy and we had a tendency to disturb the "real guests." I even remember one hotel accepting a comic convention booking and then, when some other group wanted the place on the same dates, reneging on the commitment.
Sure ain't that way these days. Just in the hotel rates alone — never mind the cash we throw around in restaurants and on taxis and other local merchants — the convention has a major impact on the economy of San Diego. As Jack Kirby — who predicted all this way back in 1973 or so — would say, "Never underestimate the power of comics!"