OFFICIAL - Hotel/Site Selection

[JohnT]

There can be only one reason why I'm posting this thread.

The Marriott declined the ApolyCon!

Dear John Thornton,

Thank you for your request for information on the Marriott Baltimore
Hunt Valley Inn.

Unfortunately, the hotel has already accepted as many groups as it can
accommodate over your requested dates.

I will be happy to check any alternate Marriott properties or other
dates for you. Please let me know your preference.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,
Ms. Kerrie White on behalf of Ms. Alexis Ziemba
Internet Sales Manager, National Group Sales
Global Sales Organization
Marriott International
Dept. 35.793.03
1818 N. 90th Street
Omaha, NE 68114
Phone: (800) 831-4004 ext. 40880 or
(402) 390-1600 ext. 2802
Fax: (402) 390-4730
E-Mail: <<alexis.ziemba@marriott.com>>

Perhaps she didn't take me seriously when I closed the RFQ with "OUR WORDS ARE BACKED WITH NUCLEAR WEAPONS!!" Think that might have put her off?

Tonight, I'll do the same process for the Holiday Inn Select (leaving out any reference to nuclear weapons). Any of you men out there with burly broadband connections who want to help a lowly organizer on a wimp-assed hotel room dial-up by finding me links to N. Baltimore hotels with conference rooms?

Thanks!

[Adrian Hon]

They shall pay for their insolence!

Having said that, for big groups normally you do need to book further in advance.

[JohnT]

According to Marriott's own convention planning guide 3-6 months out is plenty of time to secure your hotel accomodations.

[JohnT]

I replied to Kerrie:

Thank you, Kerrie, for getting back to me so promptly. Obviously your news was not what I had hoped, but all is not lost...

The particular Marriott is preferable because of its proximity to one of our guests of honor, the founder of Firaxis Games, Sid Meier - it is so close that one of the lead Programmers claim that the hotel and their corporate offices share the same driveway, that they use the selected hotel quite often for visits from venture capitalist's, other game designers, members of the media and other visitors to their corporate headquarters. Their enthusiastic response to the convention being held at the Marriott will be dampened by this news.

If you may, please look up the following possibilities:

Would there be any possibility that there are open dates from July 1st - August 10th at that particular hotel? We definitely prefer to keep the Friday-Sunday timetable, of course.

Are there other Marriott-brand hotels in the N. Baltimore area that meet our requirements for that date? Any within a 25 mile radius would be OK.

Thank you in advance for your help in answering the above.

To which she responded:

Dear Mr. T,

Thank you for getting back with me with further information. Let me first check the other dates you mentioned below with the Marriott Baltimore Hunt Valley Inn. I will be contacting you soon with availability. If that does not work out I will then start searching some
other Marriott hotels in the area and I will let you know what comes out of that early next week.

Please email me back if I can be of further assistance.

Here's hoping!

[Zopperoni]

Mr. T

Book my conference rooms, foo'!

[Imran Siddiqui]

I pity the foo' who doesn't let us have our convention there!

[Atahualpa]

While she's searching, we should think about a good military approach... just in the case of diplomacy failing.

[duke o' york]

I hate it when a plan doesn't come together.

[snoopy369]

/me thinks clearly her SDI defense needs spying ...

I'll use my Big Burly DSL to search out hotels in that area in a few minutes

[snoopy369]

Okay, i'm going to start posting GIFs and addresses To save on Poly bandwidth and etc., feel free to delete posts with your ubermodly powers after you are done with any given pic

First one: from marriott.com, there's a second Mariott related facility like across the street, or something close to that ...

* Courtyard Baltimore Hunt Valley
* 221 International Circle
* Hunt Valley, Maryland 21030 USA
# Phone: 1-410-584-7070
# Fax: 1-410-584-8151
# Sales: 1-410-584-7070 ext. 619

18 = the original Baltimore Hunt Valley Mariott, 20 = this one.

http://marriott.com/property/meetingsandevents/capacitychart.mi?marshaCode=bwihu

That should link you to the part about 'meetings and events capacity'. Underwhelming, 2 rooms 625sq feet each, but it's not as bad as the hampton inn ...

We should also consider whether it's possible to make do with suites for some of the activities (like LAN gaming) ... can we make do with 2 medium sized meeting rooms and play games in specially designated suites?

Each room would fit up to 40 people depending on the set-up ... that might be enough, right?

[snoopy369]

Embassy Suites Hotel Baltimore-North
213 International Circle, Hunt Valley, Maryland, United States 21030
Tel: +1-410-584-1400 Fax: +1-410-584-7306

This is essentially the same place as #20 above.

http://embassysuites.hilton.com/en/es/index.jhtml

This one seems to be a lot better in terms of meetings:

http://www.embassysuitesmeetings.com/global/search/Faccapacities.asp?SearchID=0&ID=14951&rxsults=&rfpid=&clusterid=&bid=

Basically a 4x1 'ballroom' of 4 pieces of 30x36 each, which make up one giant room or 4 adjoining rooms or anything in between depending on the desired setup, using removable walls. There's also the 'embassy boardroom' which is 30x15. Much better than the courtyard marriott, albeit undoubtedly more costly.

[snoopy369]

There's also a Hampton Inn Hunt Valley, but that doesn't have adequate meeting facilities for sure. I'm going to check the other two in a bit, I forgot to earlier ...

[snoopy369]

That's it for Hunt Valley. I really like that Embassy Suites, if it would work it's nearly the same place and nifty ... There are many other locations, though, in a nearby radius, just in 'baltimore' not 'hunt valley ...

[JohnT]

Thanks, Snoopy!

After we chatted Friday night I went through the process of filling out the Embassy Suites RFP. Entered all the data, calculated ballroom sectioning for varying parts of the Con, typed up a bunch of stuff, previewed it... and as I reached for my mouse, my thumb hit the "back" button on the left-side of the mouse - causing me to lose all that work. Sometimes just going "forward" to the page will make everything OK, but this was one of those pages that fully reloads everytime you want to look at it.

[DanS]

Am I correct in thinking that both of those locations are a short walk from the Hunt Valley light rail station? The first map doesn't seem to have a scale.