I started this for people to post general information, comments or questions specifically about Montreal's event. If you wish to discuss the schism between the Federation and Montreal, continue posting to that thread. Thanks.

Hmm... and no one wants to talk about it... eek!

Maybe someone from Montreal wants to comment??

I just finished looking at the site for Rendez-vous 2006 in Montreal and noticed something that causes me some concern.

I am always on the lookout for stores that offer you a great price and then hail you on hidden costs.

In the recent article from the Montreal Gazette which is posted on the Rendez-vous website, they talk about how they will raise their funds. Of course registration costs make total sende and they will raise 3.6 million dollars ©

Later you notice another cost that is hidden for everyone that is going to Montreal and I cut and paste-

Tourism Montreal / Greater Montreal Hotel Association: Will co-ordinate the bookings of 10,000 hotel rooms reserved for the games, with a $10-per-room-per-day fee going to the event. Up to $1 million is to be raised to pay for using the Olympic Stadium and the Palais des Congrès.

It seems to me that I will be paying an additional $10.00 per day for any hotel room I may book. Since the Tourism Montreal folks have a lock down on the rooms in the city, I doubt I will be able to get away from that hidden cost.

I would like to hear other peoples views on this. I am open to seeing it another way but it seems to me that this just keeps coming across like a "Gay and Lesbian Games tax"

I do know that many cities in North America have instituted a room charge that goes to the local Tourism authority for promotional events and services. If that is what this is then I think it could be framed better. Even then it still doesn't quite sit right.

Ken

One alternative way to look at it is that the hotels have agreed to pay $10 per room booked back to the organization that is bringing them business. Whether this is a hidden cost or $10 per day per room donation to the games that actually reduces your costs comes down to whether you pay $10 more for your room than you would have. My understanding, which comes from earlier discussions on the board and not from RV2006, is that RV2006 negotiated rates on the rooms that are lower than you would have paid if they just left it up to the market. According to the people on the board who are in the travel industry hotels inevitably up their rates when big events or meetings are in town so you should be saving money on this arrangement.

People other than Ken have argued that the tourism industry is going to make huge profits off the games without giving anything back, and now we have some evidence that they are giving something back and it is being looked at as a bad thing/hidden cost. Seems like they just can't win!

Give me a break! You want the Tourism people to get credit as nice guys for taking $10.00 off the top and giving it to the people that tell us their registration fee is so wonderful? And then you tell me it keeps the registration fee down so that is a good thing? Sounds like cake and eat it too!

I understand (from presentations made at the time of the bid for Gay Games VII in Johannesburg) that Tourism Montreal was able to work out a lock-down on all of the rooms and would do their best to keep the rates more as per normal. This was a great tactic which appealed to many of the delegates as it meant that participants and their friends were not going to get taken for a ride on hotel costs as per Amsterdam and Sydney. To the best of my recollection, they didn't say that $10.00 from each room rental would go to the Organizing Committee.

I will admit though that I would not even have noticed if Tourism Montreal just stated that they were making a donation in the same way as the other sponsors.

That aside, it still seems like it is a tax on the participants that lowers registration fees up front.

Ken

Hi Lindsay and Ken. My understanding from last May when Montreal was first looking for travel companies to partner with them for the Gay Games was that the 10,000 rooms allocated to RV2006 participants and visitors were locked in at 2002 rates and would all be booked through Tourism Montreal's central housing service. The hotel association is obviously an integral part of Tourism Montreal and are working in close partnership with them to ensure the event's success. The following information came to my office last May when Montreal was still expected to be hosting the Gay Games in 2006.

'2006 Gay Games Housing Bureau

The 2006 Gay Games management of room block is handled by Tourisme Montreal central housing service. Close to 10 000 rooms have been contracted by the Montreal 2006 in 26 hotels with a price range varying from 65$ to 350$ cad (2002 prices). All the hotels involved, as per contract, will give back a 10$CA per room, per night fee to the Montréal 2006 Gay Games VII Organising Committee in order to finance the cost of the infrastructures used for the events (Convention Centre, Olympic Stadium…). This fee is built in the room rate and will be returned to Montréal 2006 by the hotels. All room reservations for the official participants and visitors will go through the Housing Bureau. Attached is the room blocks available and an average price range. The local hotels are working closely with Montreal 2006 to make this event a success in every aspect and are in close contact with the organisers to inform them of potential group requests. Hotels are aware however to re-direct all requests for the 2006 Gay Games to the Housing Bureau and are very aware that the financial success of Montreal 2006 is in part tied to this.'

I assume this agreement is still in place for RV2006.

Thanks for the info Pat.

Ken, I think the underlying assumption of your posts is that athletes going to RV2006 are going to be paying an extra $10/day in hidden hotel costs. My assumption is that the hotels can afford to pay the $10/day out of the extra money they get from filling more rooms.

Clearly RV2006 could have tried to get the hotels at $10/day below 2002 rates and if they succeeded that might have been an even better deal for the athletes. In my view it is legitimate for the people that will make money off the games (hotels) to contribute to paying the costs of the games and I just don't agree that failing to negotiate a deeper discount is equivalent to imposing a "hidden tax".

Preparing to be re-educated...

TravelPat,

Thanks for that posting. I am still trying to get my head around this. Maybe it is because I just bought a new car and I found it unbelievable all of the hidden extras that you get dinged with.

Putting the hidden tax issue aside, another bell went off when I was reading that summation of the Housing Bureau for 2006.

One of the issues with any of the past Gay Games, and large events in general, is cash flow. It seems to me that the funds from the Hotel rooms will not be realized until the rooms are paid for and that will be upon completion of the event. In Sydney they ran into a similar problem with frozen funds from ticket sales. Hopefully they Montreal people are able to not consider those funds available until after the Rendez-vous is complete. Just a concern for them. No doubt they are all over that issue.

Ken

Hey Ken:
I am assuming this block would work in a similar way to the blocks of rooms that were sold through travel agents and tour operators for Sydney and Amsterdam, where participants or visitors bought prepaid packages that included various tours, welcome kits and a certain number of nights accommodation. My own company's experience with Sydney was that we had to have deposits in two years out on our block of 300+ rooms for something like 10% of the total cost of the hotel rooms for the 9 nights that we were blocking them for. Another 40% was due 180 days before the event and then all the rooms we kept had to be paid in full 90 days out. So if it is to be a similar schedule of payments in Montreal, the organizers could in fact see some money prior to the commencement of the games. And I suspect - although I am not certain, that the expectation is that a hefty chunk of the 10,000 rooms set aside in the contract with Tourism Montrteal would be distributed through prepaid packages sold by travel companies that end up partnering with Montreal as opposed to just reservations, where the hotels don't get paid until people check-out.

TravelPat,

Thanks again for the info. I believe that the Montreal folks had stated that the situation that you described was exactly what they were trying to avoid.

Certainly your scenario would explain how it could work for them.

Do you have any thoughts on what I have termed to be the "hidden room tax"?

Still trying to get my head around all of this.

Ken

My response to this debate about the "hotel tax" (I actually think about it more as the hotels paying for someone else to do their bookings, coz that is effectively what is happening the way I read it) is maybe, rather than worrying about an extra $10 for accom, why not get out there and find yourself some friends in Montreal, and organise to stay with them come 2006. Or better still, go stay with them for a fact finding mission and work out how much you are gonna enjoy Montreal with the thousands of crazy G&L sports people descending on mass... Sounds like a blast to me!!!!

And for the record, Im not associated with RDV2006, but I had a blast in Montreal last year....

Tallboi - you basically have it right in terms of the hotel tax thing. As everyone knows hotels don't really have any kind of a fixed price on their rooms. They offer different rates through different reservations systems or websites, different rates if you call the hotel directly etc. So for the same room type for the same night, someone might be paying $200.00 who booked directly with the hotel - so all $200.00 goes to the hotel. Someone else who booked through a travel agent may be paying $190.00, for which the hotel has paid $2.00 to the reservation system the travel agent booked on and $19.00 as commission to the travel agent so the hotel actually only gets $169.00 in that case. Then there may be someone staying there as part of a conference, where the conference organizers got a special rate of $175.00 - again all $175.00 going to the hotel, but the hotel providing free meeting rooms and one free hospitality suite to the conference organizers, so in that case the hotel has some other costs.

So in the case of the $10.00 to RV2006, that is just another one of those different scenarios where the hotel will grant a slightly lower price, knowing they have those rooms sold, don't have to list them on a res. system, and can be ensured they'll get their whatever - let's say $170.00 from the room and pay $10.00 to RV2006.

So it is not really simple enough, the way hotel pricing works to say that you in fact would be paying $10.00 more, simply because of that RV2006 contribution. There will likely be others staying in the same hotel that you are in for the duration of the games, in the same room type - who are not there for the games, who will pay more than you, and yes there is a chance, some may pay less.

Confusing, I know!

[ March 27, 2004, 10:49 AM: Message edited by: Travelpat ]

This ought to get some response (yes, I have a big stick I like to stir things with).

Does anyone have any info on the PARTIES that will be held during the OutGames? I went to most of the parties during the Games in Sydney and had such a great time I went back for Mardi Gras... huge disappointment... largely because the people at the parties at the Games didn't seem to be the typical circuit queen types.

Hey YVRMAN. I had a blast at the Sydney dances too! Tons of Gay Games participants at them - having a blast. It was one of the only places that I actually ran into many of my friends from previous games, and even some friends from Toronto for that matter! That is why I cringe everytime others completely slag the party scene. Fine if they don't want to go and it would be a fair criticism if resources that went into the party took away from the athletic resources. But even Richard Cobden a Sydneysider of the FGG negotiating committee who had a friend involved with organizing the dances, said the dances were a money MAKER for Sydney, not money loser as others would have you believe. They just did not make AS MUCH money off of them as they had hoped and budgeted for. I guess we must be bad people for liking the dances in some jock purists minds - Oh Well.

As for Montreal my understanding is that there will be TWO 'official' OutGames parties. On the two Saturday nights. (The night of opening and closing ceremonies).

Also because it is Divers Cite (Montreal's Pride) there will be other parties on that final weekend - including a big outdoor party on Sunday afternoon (the day after the games end which is their Pride Parade day) and that night too. But in terms of 'official' Outgames dances - just the two.

"But even Richard Cobden a Sydneysider of the FGG negotiating committee who had a friend involved with organizing the dances, said the dances were a money MAKER for Sydney, not money loser as others would have you believe. They just did not make AS MUCH money off of them as they had hoped and budgeted for."

"As for Montreal my understanding is that there will be TWO 'official' OutGames parties. On the two Saturday nights. (The night of opening and closing ceremonies)."

Unfortunately these parties (the two Saturday nights, opening and closing) were the two parties in Sydney in 2002 that significantly failed to reach budget and dragged the whole budgeted income down. One can but speculate on the reasons; but in summary I think they were ones that are sufficiently compelling to hold true of a games anywhere.

Richard Cobden

[ April 22, 2004, 02:30 AM: Message edited by: rcobden ]

Thanks for that info Richard. We (the travel company I work for), sold over 500 overall party tickets to Gay Games participants with the Party tickets being BY FAR our most requested item from the 500 or so people we took to Sydney. Swimming finals probably came in second with requests for about 40 tickets sold. In fact we sold 800 tickets in total to all the various events, opening and closing ceremonies for spectators (non-participants), competitions, shows, parties etc and well over 500 of those 800 tickets sold by us and this was to those booking travel through us of which 95%+ of whom were participants in Sydney 2002 - were to the parties!.

The main points I'm trying to make being that:
A- These parties were well attended - even by Gay Games participants
B - Overall they MADE money for the organization - meaning they contributed towards covering other costs of the Games as opposed to being a cost that drew resources away from sports.

I want to emphasize that point because over and over again on this board, certain individuals have couched their words in such a way to make people think that the dance parties took money away from what could have been spent on sports, when in fact the parties helped generate revenue to pay for the sports.

And I'm hopeful Montreal's 'official' party organizers will plan and budget realistically for the parties on those two nights, so as to maximize their net revenue to the RV2006 organization. In Sydney - I think that by having 3 other - very successful parties during the week between opening and closing - those parties may have had a bit of a negative impact on the numbers for the opening and closing, as most people I know would have gone to one or two parties and may have gone to one of the opening or closing and gone to the Black Party or the Harbour Party, but not all 4. So if there are only 2 parties being offered, I suspect those two parties may be quite successful.

[ April 22, 2004, 09:51 AM: Message edited by: Travelpat ]

TravelPat

I think that some of your points are valid and very important.

It is clear that the issue with the parties was that they didn't surplus the amount they were budgetted to surplus. That should make it clear that the parties were not the problem (other than planning parties that were not meeting the needs of the participants) the real issue was in the budgetting process!

I think that point has also been made over and over again.

The point where I disagree with you is when you think that the opening and closing parties will be successful in the absence of parties during the week.

That is where Richard speaks volumes from experience.

I for one am comfortable in watching others repeat the errors of those that went before them so long as I have done my best to draw their attention to these errors.

Also, TravelPat, if you agree that the budgetting was really the problem in Sydney - specifically when people attack the parties, then maybe you will have come closer to understanding the FGG point of view in regards to providing support and expertise to ensure that the same errors are not continued. You don't have to like it, but perhaps you will understand.

I also understand if the folks in Montreal chose to not use that expertise and go it alone. Not a problem. I applaud then in hiring Stuart Borrie in a consultant role to assist them in many facets of the operations but I am concerned that they will fall into the same optimistic trap in budgetting that previous host cities for large sporting events geared towards the Gay and Lesbian community did.

I must also question your ticket sales stats - not for validity as I do not doubt that - but for the contribution to a conclusion. The conclusion I am concerned about is that ticket sales to events such as this will be a significant income. This concept must always be tempered within the budgetting process. If not, shortfalls will continue to occur and it will appear that no education will have ever occurred.

That being said, I have personally met many of the folks on the S2002 BOD and have great respect for Peter and Bev. With 20/20 hindsight I am sure that they would tell us how to avoid those budget shortfalls and still be successful.

Ken

[ April 22, 2004, 11:36 AM: Message edited by: kenmac ]

Frankly, I don't trust vague assertions about unaudited finances coming from a financial fiasco, reported by someone with a self-confessed financial interest in both Sydney and Montreal. It raises suspicion that these assertions might just be Greedhead propaganda - ya think?