Coloradoan Winter - your source for winter fun, ski-reports

January 21, 2001
Overall revenue up, demand low for Olympic tickets
By Tom Gorman
Los Angeles Times
    SALT LAKE CITY - Eighteen days from the opening of the 2002 Winter Games, Olympic riches are blowing along the slopes of the Wasatch Mountains like a capricious blizzard - piled up head-high here, blown clear there.
    While these Olympics have set a record for ticket revenue, independent brokers are selling tickets at a loss, downtown hotels are losing thousands of reservations, homeowners can't find visitors to rent their houses, and local ski resorts complain that the games have scared away business.
    The biggest winner so far in the run for the gold is the Salt Lake Organizing Committee, which has sold $173 million in tickets - more than double the record amount spent four years ago in Nagano, Japan.
    Organizers report selling 88 percent of 1.6 million tickets for Olympic events, including virtually all of the $885 tickets for the prized opening ceremonies.
    It's unclear how many of those tickets were purchased by speculators when tickets went on sale two years ago. In Utah, it's legal to resell tickets for a profit. Citing reasons ranging from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks to the economic downturn to people put off by the high prices, brokers last week said they are scrambling to sell their inventory.
    Various brokers were offering opening-ceremony tickets at $150 to $200 below face value.
    "There are so many tickets available, it's cutthroat," said ticket broker Steve Sadiq. "I'm getting calls from lots of sellers, but there aren't enough buyers. These sellers originally thought they'd make a killing, but it's the other way around."
    Another local broker, Stan Johnson, said speculators counted on people making last-minute decisions to attend the games. "And there may have been a lot of undecided people out there. But that was before 9-11. That made up their minds not to come."
    Empty rooms are turning up at prime downtown hotels as corporate sponsors reduce their post-Sept. 11 entertainment budgets and international news media cut back because of the cost of covering the war in Afghanistan. The Olympic organizing committee itself released 5,000 of the 20,000 rooms it had reserved for sponsors and others.
    Last-minute visitors can easily book choice rooms.
    "We knew this would happen - that as the games drew closer, we'd have more and more rooms come available," said Rip Rippetoe, executive director of the city's Visitor Information Service, which offers reservations assistance.
    "Sponsors and other corporations reserved blocks of rooms several years ago, to save them for their Olympics hospitality programs," Rippetoe said. "But then, when it comes down to budget time and they better know what they actually need or can afford, they whittle down their reservations."
    Hotels that bumped up their rates are now reducing prices. Other hotels that six months ago demanded minimum lengths of stay - including some for the entire 17-day run of the Olympics - are releasing rooms for shorter stays.
    "The entire hotel market is like Jell-O," Rippetoe said.
    Operators of ski lodges and condominiums complain that they are having difficulty filling rooms, even at regular seasonal rates.
    "People think all of the resorts are involved in the Olympics, and they're staying clear of us," said Nathan Rafferty, spokesman for Ski Utah, a marketing association for 14 local ski resorts. "But if they were to come to these other resorts, they wouldn't even know the Olympics were in town."
    He said regular customers are rescheduling their vacations, partly to avoid anticipated congestion at the Salt Lake airport. Rafferty called it "the Olympics backlash."
    At Gold Miner's Daughter, an 80-room lodge at the Alta ski resort area outside Salt Lake City, 20 rooms at regular seasonal rates remain available during President's Day weekend, which falls after the opening of the Olympics. Normally, the lodge is sold out.
    Such hits to the local economy during an otherwise financial bonanza - called "leakage" - were anticipated by Olympic planners. Clearly, for instance, the city could not accommodate its usual convention business.
    "There will be a net gain to our state economy because of the games, but hosting the Olympics can be disruptive," said Natalie Gochnour, Gov. Mike Leavitt's deputy for policy issues. "We anticipate a pause in our economy after the games, and during the games there will be disruptions to local business."
    The Olympics are projected to contribute $2.1 billion to the state economy, including the $1.3 billion organizers are spending to stage the games. About $400 million has been spent on public works projects, and the anticipated 70,000 daily visitors are expected to spend another $350 million.
    The local losses from the Sept. 11 attacks are hard to measure, though their impact on the overall travel and tourism industry is well documented.
    Ticket sales for individual Olympic events averaged about $150,000 a day before Sept. 11, said Mitt Romney, president of the SLOC. Immediately after the attacks, they dropped to $10,000 a day, but have grown steadily since - to $100,000 a day in December, $200,000 a day in January and, last week, $300,000 a day.
    Of 167 events, 76 are officially sold out. The hottest event tickets are for the men's hockey gold-medal round, the most expensive at $450, and the final nights of figure skating, with the choicest seats going for $375.
    Tickets can be had for as little as $25 for those willing to stand in the freezing cold to view cross-country skiing and the biathalon, or $20 for indoor, short-track speed skating.
    Romney told reporters last week he expects the pace of ticket sales to increase once the Games begin.
    "And our expectation is that, just like in Sydney, we'll see a lot of last-minute buyers," Romney said. Officials say, however, that the rush of last-minute ticket buying will be existing ticket-holders buying more, rather than new visitors arriving in town.

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