[Lnc-business] Informal Poll LNC December Meeting

[Joshua Katz]

I take no position on whether we use a contractor or not.  I also, as a
side note, would love to see New Orleans - it's been on my list for quite
some time.  When I moved to Texas, I in fact got off at New Orleans to see
the city, but my schedule didn't permit an overnight stay.  Neither did my
budget, which is the concern I raise today.  The hotel we are considering
for this convention will cost us about $5000 to hold an LNC meeting there.
 I am assuming that this is with the knowledge that we are considering them
as a venue for a major convention, hence a really good deal (respective to
the hotel.)  I understand that the average cost of an LNC meeting is in the
neighborhood of $2500.  I am only guess, then, that this will be a quite
expensive convention.  Floor fee or no, the more expensive the venue, the
less we are likely to net profit/greater net loss, unless either:
1.  We have states who have more willing delegates than spots (not too
many) and an expensive venue will keep the poorer delegates away, thus
increasing sales of larger packages.  I would object to this on moral
grounds if I thought it, in fact, were the case, but I don't.
2.  We charge more for packages that are substantially the same.  Of
course, for instance, banquet tickets will cost more at a costlier location
(I'd expect) since food costs will be higher - and of course we don't know
where the point of unitary elasticity is, although I strongly suspect (see
1 above) that this point doesn't move when the convention is held at a
fancier location.

Given the cost of this venue for an LNC meeting, I therefore lean towards
it not being a great venue for a convention, and would support having the
meeting at the Hampton Inn instead.  I would add that, while it's a good
idea in any case, we really need to minimize costs for the next couple LNC
meetings since we are, in a sense, bankrupt.  So even if using the Hampton
Inn will increase costs in the future, I think it makes sense at this
particular moment to defer some costs into the future - time preference,
etc.



Joshua A. Katz

Region 8 (Region of Badassdom) Alternate
Libertarian National Committee

Chair, Libertarian Party of Connecticut


On Fri, Aug 1, 2014 at 11:53 AM, Scott L. <scott73 at earthlink.net> wrote:

>
>
> I strongly agree with what the Secretary wrote below.
>
>
>
> Ms.  Mattson did a spectacular job of creating spreadsheets comparing the
> competing hotels for 2012 and 2014, but needless to say it took her a lot
> of time to create those spreadsheets.
>
>
>
> I think it would be a very good idea to use Helms-Briscoe to help us
> select the 2018 Convention site.
>
>
>   Scott Lieberman
>
>
>  ------------------------------
>
>
>
> “Helms Briscoe helps scout out options for meeting sites within whatever
> parameters we give them.  They solicit the bids for us from the hotels.  We
> can tell them what data we want to know about each property, and they'll
> collect it for us.
>
> The committee we appoint to oversee the process will narrow the field down
> based on data comparisons, and Helms Briscoe will further negotiate the
> offers with the finalists.
>
> Helms Briscoe does not have any authority to commit us to anything on
> their own.  We have the final say.  In the end, after all the data assembly
> is done, if we don't like any of the offers on the table, we can walk away
> and can do it a different way if needed.
>
> During the LNC meeting at which we were going to vote on the 2016 site,
> there were two Helms Briscoe agents on site.  While we were debating other
> business, they were in the hallway on the phones with the finalists
> leveraging the offers against each other to get additional last-minute
> concessions.  At the time of the vote, they came in and told us which items
> on our spreadsheets they had improved in the meantime - this one dropped
> their guest room rate by $10/night, that one lowered their food/beverage
> requirement, the other one is offering new perks, etc.
>
>
>
> The LNC is billed nothing for this service.  If we accept one of the
> contracts Helms Briscoe negotiated for us, then they get paid by the
> hotel...kind of like how a realtor gets paid out of the seller's revenues.
>
> Speaking as a person who did a lot of work for the 2012 and 2014 site
> scouting processes, using Helms Briscoe for 2016 saved me an incredible
> amount of time so I could do other projects instead.
>
> Their people have a lot of experience in event planning and negotiating
> these types of contracts.  We can have experts on our side even if the LNC
> members aren't experts in the subject.
>
> If circumstances change and something goes sour with the contract after it
> is signed, Helms Briscoe agents will step back in to assist us while we
> navigate the problem with the hotel.
>
> I was very pleased with the experience with them last time.
>
> We should decide early on whether or not to use them for 2018, *before*
> we solicit any formal bids from hotels.  If we use them, Helms Briscoe
> should submit our RFP, collect the bids, and take the ball from there.
>
>
>
>   Alicia”
>
> _______________________________________________
> Lnc-business mailing list
> Lnc-business at hq.lp.org
> http://hq.lp.org/mailman/listinfo/lnc-business_hq.lp.org
>
>
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