They’re leaving the lights on

Now that travelers to Northwest Arkansas are landing in Benton County, more of them will be staying there. At least that’s the contingency many of the area’s hotel owners and managers are planning for.

Since the Nov. 1 opening of the regional airport at Highfill — and the subsequent announcements that at least four of the five air carriers from Fayetteville’s Drake Field are moving to the new facility — Washington County is showing a decrease in occupancy rates. Not all of hoteliers are ready to admit it.

But a few, like Bill Clodfelter, district manager for Hobbs & Curry FLP of Fort Smith, are dealing aggressively with the problem. Clodfelter, whose employer owns the Clarion Inn in Fayetteville and both the Sleep Inn and the Clarion Hotel & Convention Center in Bentonville, says the airport has literally relocated the area’s center.

“People who travel want to stay near the airport, not necessarily the place where they’re doing business,” Clodfelter says. “So if you’re calling on Wal-Mart and flying into Fayetteville, the likelihood is you’ll stay in Fayetteville and make the drive.

“But if you’re flying into Bentonville, there’s no reason to come to Fayetteville.”

With an estimated 7,000 vendors calling on the world’s largest retailer every month, that’s a lot of lost traffic. The Fayetteville Clarion may have taken the earliest hit.

For the last 10 years, the hotel has been the stopover for 90 percent of Drake’s airline pilots, co-pilots and attendants. That’s roughly 32 crews rotating in and out 365 days per year. Now, all of the crews except ASA’s, the Delta connector, that’s deading for Highill at the end of this month, have left.

“That’s 20 percent of our occupancy gone off the top,” Clodfelter says. “We’ve also lost our business passengers who flew into here, which was probably another 20 percent of our business.”

Fortunately for Hobbs & Curry, it has two hotels in Bentonville and expects to pick up the lion’s share of transferred business. The city of Fayetteville may not be as lucky.

Hotels in Fayetteville are banking on the opening of a new town center on the Fayetteville square sometime in 2000 or 2001. In the meantime, several are increasing their rates to offset the loss of guests, which in turn inflates hotel-motel-restaurant tax revenues.

Those factors, along with the traditional winter off-season for tourists, make it difficult to interpret anything from Fay-etteville’s December HMR numbers.

January’s reports for Fayetteville and Bentonville are due at the end of February.

“It’s pretty much a flat line right now,” says Brian Swain, assistant administrative services director for Fayetteville. “It’s still a little early, but certainly when all of the airlines are gone, we expect that to affect HMR revenues.

“We’re hoping the opening of Interstate 540 will lesson the impact. We’ll have less individual business travelers, but we’re hoping for an increase in tourism.”

Seven thousand visitors to the world’s largest retailer every month is a given. It’s difficult to gauge how many visitors the opening of a highway will draw to Fay-etteville.

Alex Jerde, general manager of the 235-room Fayetteville Hilton, says his business’ strategy has been to switch its market focus. Instead of going after the corporate market, the Hilton wants to attract conventions.

“We think our downtown Fayetteville location gives us a lot to offer,” Jerde says. “It’s close to where the Fayetteville town center is going to be on the square, and we’re a block from the night life and restaurants on Dickson Street. We feel like we can comfortably accommodate anything from a wedding to a state or national convention.”

Jerde admits Dickson Street is not New York’s Broadway or even Memphis’ Beale Street. But he says “it’s 10-fold better than what any other community in the area has to offer.” And as long as national business travelers have some spare time, they’re still going to want to spend it in the most enjoyable area possible.

“What’s going to happen is as soon as they have some free time on their hands, they’re going to find out Benton County is dry,” Jerde says. “And if entertainment is what they seek, they’re going to have to come down to Fayetteville.”

A story that appeared in the March 8, 1998, edition of the New York Times Magazine would support Jerde’s theory. It pokes fun at Bentonville, calling it “Vendorville” and suggests that when the Bentonville Chamber of Commerce refers to “the metroplex” of Bentonville, Rogers and Springdale, it must be including livestock as well as people.

But Judy Lea, manager of the Bentonville Convention & Visitors Bureau, says her city is already experiencing an 8 percent increase in hotel-motel tax revenue from last year. She says next year it will probably be another 10 percent.

“We’re up $2,000 to $3,000 for December of 1999 compared to December 1998,” Lea says. “Once we get the other airlines on line up here and the word gets out about how close the airport is to Bentonville, I think we’ll see even more traffic.

“Right now we think we’re having a lot of repeat business and it’s just hard to tell.”

The Clarion Hotel & Convention Center, Sleep Inn and the Holiday Inn Express have all opened in the last 13 months in Bentonville and Springfield Suites is set to open later this spring.

The rest of Bentonville’s increased tourism tax revenue, Lea says, is coming from general growth.

“Fayetteville is fortunate to still have the University of Arkansas here with all the activities it has for everyone,” Clodfelter says. “The full impact of the loss of the airport has not been seen yet, but supply and demand of customers will dictate rates in both cities. We haven’t dropped our weekday rates yet, but they may have to come down.

“On the other hand, Wal-Mart is all Bentonville’s got and you see signs all over the place up there for discounted weekend rates. We may still do OK on the weekends in Fayetteville.”

Jerde says despite the loss of an economic engine like Drake Field, his sales staff is not buying into the “gloom and doom” expectations for the Fayetteville market.

“We’re setting up appointments not just to solicit new business,” Jerde says. “We’re looking for regular business, too. What people have to keep in mind is while we may take a sharp dip for a year or two, I think it will come back in the next couple of years and continue to steadily increase all over the region.”