Northwest Arkansas business owners hope for good Razorbacks season to boost business

SPRINGDALE -- Northwest Arkansas hoteliers have more than just school pride on the line when the Razorbacks kick off this afternoon. A winning season on the field translates into more dollars in the cash registers.

"The better the team is, the more rabid the fans are," said Alex Jerde, general manager of Fayetteville's Hilton Garden Inn.

The Razorbacks are nationally ranked as they enter today's game against the University of Texas at El Paso.

The team also has a lot of momentum from last season, winning three of its last four games, including a victory over Texas in the Texas Bowl, said Chris Freet, University of Arkansas senior associate athletic director for external operations and strategic communications.

Season ticket sales are up 2.3 percent over last year with 45,240 sold as of Thursday. Arkansas sold more than 50,000 season tickets for the 2012 season after coming off an 11-2 season and a Cotton Bowl win against Kansas State. The next season the team went 4-8.

Current coach Bret Bielema was 3-9 his first season in 2013, and ticket sales were down as much as 16 percent.

October occupancy rates for Fayetteville hotels mirror the win-loss trend. Occupancy dropped 3 percent to 51.2 percent in 2013 before jumping up to 65 percent last year, according to the STR Report published by Smith Travel Research, a company that monitors and analyzes the hotel industry. Hotels across Northwest Arkansas had a 68.8 percent occupancy rate last October, up from 60.3 percent in 2013 and 58.9 percent in 2012.

Northwest Arkansas had 8,105 rooms in 97 hotels in July.

Jessica Leonard, communications manager for the Fayetteville Visitors Bureau, said hotels aren't sold out this weekend, but that's typical for a nonconference game.

"We are hoping people are coming up a little earlier and staying a little later to make it a nice long weekend," she said of Monday's Labor Day holiday.

Jerde said he isn't seeing many reservations for long weekends at his 115-bed hotel. He said most hotels require a two-night minimum during football season, and since the first game is against a Conference USA opponent, some people are opting to do a final vacation or go camping.

The Chancellor Hotel in downtown Fayetteville is already booked for next year's games, said Al Stento, general manager.

"We are one of the closest hotels to the field. I can see Old Main from my window," he said.

Stento has only been on the job a few weeks, and, while this is his first Razorback football game, he's dealt with college crowds before. He ran a hotel in Austin, Texas, home of the University of Texas, for five years.

"That was crazy, but bigger and more spread out," he said. "Everyone is telling me it will be crazy around here."

Hotels outside of Fayetteville also benefit, but to a lesser degree. Emmanuel Gardinier, general manager of 21c Museum Hotel in Bentonville, said the hotel is full most weekends, but few guests are in town for the football games.

"We get some people who are escaping from Fayetteville," he said of the 104-room boutique hotel.

Freet said he expects Saturday's game attendance to be in the high 60,000, adding other games are already selling out. Only a handful of tickets remained Friday afternoon for the Sept. 19 matchup against Texas Tech.

Next year's home slate includes games against Florida, Alabama and LSU, which will help drive season ticket sales even higher, Freet said.

"That will be a phenomenal season," he said.

Kathy Deck, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Arkansas, said hotels aren't the only beneficiaries of football-generated money.

The Center for Business and Economic Research prepared a report on the economic impact of the University of Arkansas that showed 399,124 people attended football games at Reynolds Razorback Stadium last year, and about 75 percent traveled from outside the area.

Researchers determined each visitor spent an average of $79.91 in Northwest Arkansas on items such as food, clothing and gasoline, taking total economic impact to $24.1 million or about $4 million per game.

Razorback Stadium holds 72,000, and, if all six home games are sell-outs, it could push spending to $5.8 million per game.

J.R. Shaw, executive director of Visit Rogers, said Rogers' hotels are strong in the meeting and convention market and not as reliant on football season.

Rogers benefits on the retail side, with visitors hitting everything from big box stores near Interstate 49 to boutiques in downtown, he said.

Kalene Griffith, president and CEO of Visit Bentonville, said new restaurants around town are one of Bentonville's fan draws. Visitors may also stop by Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art or the Scott Family Amazeum.

Dana Engelbert said more than 60,000 people have visited the Amazeum since it opened six weeks ago. She said they are expecting a lot of guests this weekend mainly because of the Labor Day holiday.

Engelbert doesn't rule out future events with a Razorback twist.

"We're still just getting into the swing of things," she said. "We're doing a lot of listening to what visitors want."

Griffith said each of the area's larger towns finds its own way to benefit from the weekend visitors.

"I think Northwest Arkansas is fortunate that we have some fantastic experiences in our cities that are a little different. We can cater to people on different levels," she said.

NW News on 09/05/2015