<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=us-ascii"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;">SO is there a company we can hire to give us a list of companies to give us a list of hotels we can consider?<div><br></div><div>Also, where is this spreadsheet that was used?</div><div><br></div><div>Daniel<br><div><div>On Aug 1, 2014, at 8:51 PM, Daniel Wiener <<a href="mailto:wiener@alum.mit.edu">wiener@alum.mit.edu</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div dir="ltr"><div>We went through exactly this same debate two years ago, with Mark Hinkle wanting to fire Helms-Briscoe and Alicia defending our use of them. I also put in my two cents. So rather than having everyone re-invent the arguments we had back then, I thought I'd forward the main email thread of that debate. If you want to wade through it, I suggest reading it in chronological order from the bottom up.<br>
<br></div>Dan Wiener<br><div><br><div class="gmail_quote">---------- Forwarded message ----------<br>From: <b class="gmail_sendername">Daniel Wiener</b> <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:wiener@alum.mit.edu">wiener@alum.mit.edu</a>></span><br>
Date: Thu, Nov 29, 2012 at 5:05 PM<br>Subject: Re: [Lnc-discuss] Time to fire Helms-Briscoe<br>To: <a href="mailto:lnc-discuss@hq.lp.org">lnc-discuss@hq.lp.org</a><br><br><br>Mark, since Alicia Mattson was on the Convention Oversight Committee last year and I wasn't, I asked her for her comments regarding Helms Briscoe. Here is her response:<div class="">
<br><br><div style="margin-left:40px"><b>Here is the message I sent to the COC list in response to Mark's
12/30/11 email, and I'll continue with new comments below the mesg.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>On Mon, Jan 2, 2012 at 4:21 PM, Alicia Mattson <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:agmattson@gmail.com" target="_blank">agmattson@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br></b>
<blockquote style="border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;padding-left:1ex" class="gmail_quote">
<div><b>I think the 2016 site selection process hasn't yet played out
enough to determine how well Helms Briscoe has worked for us. We
haven't yet let them get started negotiating because we haven't done the
first round of eliminations to give her a shorter list to work with.</b></div>
<div><b> </b></div>
<div><b>The LNC voted to select the 2016 site by the end of our term. To
get it done, we need to let Sandy's process play out because the COC and
staff need to focus on 2012. If in the end, the negotiated rates don't
match our needs, we don't have to use any of her proposals. We can
walk away. But we don't have time to do it ourselves, so let's give her
a chance to finish the job.</b></div>
<div><b> </b></div>
<div><b>If it doesn't work out, it doesn't, and the next board can start over with 2016.</b></div>
<div><b> </b></div>
<div><b>Let's do a first-round of cuts and let her go to work.</b></div><b><span><font color="#888888">
<div> </div>
<div>-Alicia</div></font></span></b></blockquote></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>Convention hotel contracts are like buying a car. From the start,
both sides know that everything is negotiable. The car dealer puts
sticker price on the window, but that means nothing. It's a starting
point. It's the same with convention hotel scouting. And in the end,
our delegates will not be paying $126/night at the Rosen Centre. The
story did not end there.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>Helms Briscoe started by bringing us 33 properties that they
thought could be negotiated into our price range, or properties that we
specifically requested. After we did first-round eliminations based on
other factors, we gave Helms Briscoe a short list of our 8 favorites and
asked them to commence further negotiations with that smaller group.
When they brought us the second round of offers, we then had 5 out of
the 8 that were in our price range and were viable options. Only 1 of
those 5 had put an original sticker-price offer in our range. I think
it is horribly unfair to say they didn't bring us what we asked for,
when we got several into the desired room night price range, and in the
end we were able to bring 3 proposals to the LNC, each of which were
perfectly acceptable and competitive options within our requested specs.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>We asked state chairs to let us know if they had a particular city
or even a specific hotel they wanted included for consideration. Some
state chairs responded, and Helms Briscoe included every specific
request we received, whether or not it fit the COC criteria. Some state
chairs just had no idea that a hotel they requested was too small for
us. The hotel Mark mentioned with 255 rooms was in Charleston, SC. It
was specifically requested to be included by COC member Stewart Flood.
We knew it was too small by itself, but the offer they gave us was to
spread delegates across multiple hotels in a complex surrounding a
convention center. It is not at all fair to say that this represented
Helms Briscoe offering us something inadequate and that it demonstrates
their incompetence. We requested it to be included, and we would have
had a sufficient number of rooms when all the neighboring hotels in the
group were combined.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>The $99 price that the Rosen Centre gave Stewart and Vicki before
we turned the project over to Helms Briscoe was without any context. It
was a barebones offer without the full detail of how much F&B they
would require, our attrition rates, how much we'd pay for vendor tables,
setup costs, shipping concessions, and all the dozens of other
parameters on the spreadsheet we use to compare convention offers. It's
all about the whole package, not one single data point.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>Anyone who says Helms Briscoe offers no value to us is clearly a
person who didn't have to do all the work for the previous two contracts
we did last term for 2012 and 2014. For each of those projects which
we did on our own, I was the one who did the majority (but certainly not
all) of the work. Without Helms Briscoe, LNC members spent
countless hours of volunteer time to scour the country for hotels that
we could fit in, solicit bids, track down all the tech specs for the
hotels to build those giant spreadsheets, review historical contracts
and usage data for context on how to negotiate the new contracts, use
the hotels as leverage against each other, and get the contract done
with the best offer. I personally spent well over 100 hours of time on
those projects.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>By comparison, for the 2016 scouting project I barely had to lift a
finger. I only had to invest a few hours of time providing specs to
HB, reviewing data, teleconferencing with the COC. And then I did site
visits at the three finalists. HB did the rest. To say that HB offers
no added value is to say that the time they saved me and other COC
members was worthless. I disagree with that notion.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>Besides the non-trivial time savings factor, by using Helms Briscoe
for 2016, we got other improvements in the package deals. We got
better concessions from the hotel in areas besides just guest room
rates. Even while the LNC was in session at the meeting in which we
first selected a 2016 site last term, two reps of Helms Briscoe were in
the hallway on their phones still making the hotels fight for our
business. As a result, they got last-minute improvements in all the
offers, things that saved the LNC money or got us more bang for our
buck. Had we not made the Rosen Centre compete with the other offers,
they would not have been as generous in other areas. And if some future
problem arises with the 2016 contract, like maybe our room block
doesn't sell all of the guest rooms we committed to use as has at times
happened in the past, Helms Briscoe will come back in to negotiate the
trouble for us so we don't lose our shirts.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>Then there's the matter of contract terms even after the LNC has
decided to choose a particular hotel. Every little clause in that
contract represents risk or potential cost for one side or the other.
What are the penalties/remedies if party to the contract can't do what
they agreed to? Etc. I have reviewed the terms of the last 5 contracts
that we negotiated on our own without using a professional firm, and it
is my opinion that Helms Briscoe did a better job of that on the 2016
deal than we have done on our own in the past.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>If the question is whether to use them for small events like an LNC
meeting, I don't know if it's a large enough package deal for Helms
Briscoe to have a lot of negotiating leverage. But because of their
extensive database of hotel properties, they can probably find
options faster than we can. With a convention, we're offering the hotel
hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of revenue, so it's worth their
fighting for it. I don't know that hotels would fight too hard for
30-ish room nights. It would probably be worth a try once just to see
how it compares to what Robert usually can get on his own. If they only
do equally as well as Robert, but they save Robert a lot of time that
he could spend on something else, that's a benefit.</b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b> </b></div>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b>But if the question is whether to use them again for our
conventions, I'd do it in a heartbeat. They were wonderful to deal
with, and we got a really good result with minimal effort on our part.</b></div></div><div><img src="http://images/cleardot.gif"></div><div class="HOEnZb"><div class="h5"><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">
On Wed, Nov 28, 2012 at 7:26 PM, Mark Hinkle <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:mark@garlic.com" target="_blank">mark@garlic.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
<div>Dan,<br>
<br>
You want proof. Please see attached spreadsheet from
Helms-Briscoe entitled LNC 2016 - Finalist hotels.<br>
<br>
You'll see very clearly that they (Helms-Briscoe) negotiated the
Rosen Centre down to $115 per night as compared to the $99 room
rate that was offered to Vicki Kirkland and Stewart Flood,
independent of Helms-Briscoe.<br>
<br>
That's after the initial first pass of $126 per night (see
spreadsheet named Hotel Availability Report, LNC, 2016, vers 1,
10-23-11).<br>
<br>
And as you know, our final rate is down to $95 per night plus a
host of other goodies that made the Rosen Centre, by far, the best
financial deal for both our members and the LP.<br>
<br>
So, first pass by Helms-Briscoe is $126 per night. Second pass is
$115 per night.<br>
<br>
Both of those are higher than the rate offered directly to Vicki
Kirkland and Stewart Flood @ $99 per night by the Rosen Center
folks.<br>
<br>
If it weren't for the initiative of Vicki, Stewart, and the Rosen
Centre's Linda, we likely would be paying far more using
Helms-Briscoe, than if we had done it ourselves.<br>
<br>
So, tell me again, where's the value add in using Helms-Briscoe?<br>
<br>
I don't see it.<br>
<br>
We already know, thanks to Admiral Colley, that we can contact the
corporate offices of the major hotel chains and give them our
specifications. They'll do the searching for us and without any
expense.<br>
<br>
Thanks to Alicia Mattson, we now have a spreadsheet that we can
use to compare/contrast hotels.<br>
<br>
We have the expertise in both volunteers and paid staff to do
ourselves and at a lower cost.<br>
<br>
So, again, what's the advantage of paying more for less?<br>
<br>
I don't see it. Time to fire Helms-Briscoe and move on.<br>
<br>
Yours in liberty.................Mark Hinkle,<br>
LNC At-Large & Retired LP Chair <br>
<br>
P.S. our specs called for room rates of $139 or less. So, why
even include hotels that have run rates of $249-259 per night plus
taxes, etc.???<br>
P.P.S. our specs call for convention floor square footage of
20,000, so why include a hotel with 10,500 square foot for their
largest room???<br>
P.P.P.S. our specs call for 350 peak nights sleeping rooms, so why
include a hotel with only 255 rooms???<br>
<pre cols="72">"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men."
- Samuel Adams</pre>
On 11/28/2012 4:56 PM, Daniel Wiener wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite">Mark,<br>
<br>
Although I was not on the Convention Oversight Committee, my
recollection of the various discussions last year was that Helms
Briscoe presented us with an initial list of potential hotels that
met a variety of requirements (size of convention hall,
availability for our date range, etc.), but with the clear
understanding that Helms Briscoe would not be seriously
negotiating down the room rates until we had first narrowed our
selection down to some finalists. At that point they'd be able to
squeeze the hotels for much better prices. And that is in fact
what happened, as indicated by this email from Kevin Knedler:<br>
<br>
<div style="margin-left:40px"><b><i>---------- Forwarded message
----------</i><br>
<i>From: <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:kknedler@columbus.rr.com" target="_blank">kknedler@columbus.rr.com</a>></span></i><br>
<i>Date: Thu, Feb 2, 2012 at 9:22 AM</i><br>
<i>Subject: [Lnc-discuss] 2016 LP convention update</i><br>
<i>To: <a href="mailto:lnc-discuss@hq.lp.org" target="_blank">lnc-discuss@hq.lp.org</a></i><br>
<br>
<i>It is moving along very nicely.</i><br>
<i>
Helms Briscoe continues to get better rates and negotiate
for us.</i><br>
<i>
We are down to 4 sites, and soon will be 3 I hope.</i><br>
<i>
Top contenders for 2016 will be:</i><br>
<i>
Hyatt of downtown Jacksonville, FL</i><br>
<i>
Rosen Plaza of Orlando, FL</i><br>
<i>
Bonaventure of Los Angeles, CA</i><br>
<i>
Marriott of Atlanta, GA-- request to remove is on the
table</i><br>
<br>
<i>
All are worthy of being finalists.</i><br>
<i>
The top three have great walkability with other attractions
and things to do.</i><br>
<br>
<i>
The COC will be meeting to clear up some more loose ends and
pin down the dates.</i><br>
<i>
We do plan to present these for a vote at the LNC meeting on
March 10, per the previous voted-upon direction of the LNC.</i><br>
<i>
There may likely be presenations by the hotel and CVB
staff-- much like Columbus meeting in August of 2011.</i><br>
<br>
<i>
There were naysayers that said it couldn't be done. Well, we
can indeed do this, just as other organizations do.</i><br>
<i>
I am proud of the process an work by H.B. and the
subcommittee of the COC.</i><br>
<i>
Thank you.</i><br>
</b><i><b>
KJKnedle</b>r</i><br>
</div>
<br>
Now maybe we could have done better all by ourselves, and maybe
not. Unfortunately we weren't able to run a controlled experiment
in an alternate universe to definitively answer that question, so
all we can do is speculate. Your gut instinct apparently tells
you that we'd have been better off without Helms Briscoe. But so
far you haven't given me any hard data to support your opinion.<br>
<br>
I find it quite credible that Helms Briscoe did a competent job of
coming up with an initial list of hotels, and then did a competent
job of negotiating a favorable contract (including reasonable room
rates) after we trimmed down the list. Given their "volume
purchasing" power, I also consider it likely that the hotel had to
also absorb Helms Briscoe's fee without passing it on to us, and
that we would not have been able to negotiate anything lower on
our own even in the absence of that fee. I think that is exactly
analogous to the situation in which a home seller has to absorb
the real estate agent's fee in order to be listed in the MLS and
attract enough prospects. The home buyer is not paying that fee
and it is not passed on to him as a higher price than he could
otherwise negotiate. Home sellers who try to sell on their own do
so in hopes of pocketing that fee, not to give the home buyer a
discount, and it often backfires on them. It's the real estate
market -- supply and demand -- which dictates the selling price.
The same logic applies to the hotel industry, if not more so,
because hotels (like airlines) have a "wasting" inventory which is
time-sensitive and ceases to exist if not used.<br>
<br>
The bottom line is that I believe Helms Briscoe did a good job on
our behalf and earned whatever fee the hotel gave them. Yes,
we've muddled through for 40 years without Helms Briscoe, and
sometimes that has worked out well and sometimes it has been a
disaster. If we decide in the future that we can do it
better/cheaper/easier than with Helms Briscoe, I'm fine with
that. But I'm still waiting for some evidence to convince me.<br>
<br>
Dan Wiener<br>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Nov 28, 2012 at 1:14 PM, Mark
Hinkle <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:mark@garlic.com" target="_blank">mark@garlic.com</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
<div>Dan,<br>
<br>
My comments below.
<div><br>
<pre cols="72">"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men."
- Samuel Adams</pre>
</div>
<div> On 11/28/2012 11:09 AM, Daniel Wiener
wrote:<br>
</div>
</div>
<div>
<blockquote type="cite">Mark,<br>
<br>
Your numbers below do not accurately reflect the final
room rate of $95 which Helms Briscoe was able to
negotiate for us for the 2016 national convention at the
Rosen Centre. I think that is a very good rate, and
evidence of an excellent job by Helms Briscoe which
fully justified their commission. Furthermore, room
rates are not the only consideration in obtaining the
lowest overall cost for convention attendees. Parking
fees, wifi, meal costs, A/V, etc. all must be factored
in. It's far from clear that we could have done a
better job on our own of negotiating a total package at
a better price.<br>
</blockquote>
</div>
I didn't intend my comments to reflect the final deal with
the Rosen Centre, but do demonstrate the incompetence of
Helms-Briscoe in following our specifications, i.e. room
rates under $139 per night.<br>
<br>
When they sent us 29 hotels, of which only 2 made the cut,
that's just incompetence.
<div><br>
<blockquote type="cite"> <br>
And just because Helms Briscoe gets paid their
commission by the hotel doesn't necessarily mean that it
is being passed on to us as a buried charge. Helms
Briscoe handles a huge amount of convention business for
hotels throughout the country, and consequently they get
the equivalent of a volume discount from those hotels.
Part of that volume discount goes to Helms Briscoe as
their fee. The hotels know that they will lose future
business if they don't provide Helms Briscoe with
superior rates. The Libertarian Party, which puts on a
moderate-size convention every two years in scattered
locations, doesn't have that kind of buying power.<br>
</blockquote>
</div>
All costs of doing business are passed onto the consumer.
We're the consumer. Hence the cost of Helms-Briceo is
passed onto us in the form of higher prices.<br>
<br>
If Helms-Briscoe can get volume pricing for it's customers,
how come their initial pricing for us was $126 per night
versus the $99 per night that was offered to Vicki &
Stewart???
<div><br>
<blockquote type="cite"> <br>
Nor does it mean that the hotels are losing money by
offering better rates to Helms Briscoe. A hotel that
fails to book a convention has empty rooms and empty
meeting halls, but most of its overhead remains
unchanged. It's just like with airlines, where the
planes still have to fly whether they are half full or
packed, and it therefore makes sense to discount tickets
to fill the plane up since the operating cost of an
empty seat versus one with a passenger in it is minimal.<br>
</blockquote>
</div>
I never mentioned anything about hotels losing money.
That's a red herring.
<div><br>
<blockquote type="cite"> <br>
I hear the same argument when people try to buy or sell
a home on their own to avoid real estate broker
commissions. Some individuals are successful doing it
themselves, but more often they misjudge the hidden
costs and the opportunity costs involved (e.g.,
non-access to the Multiple Listing Service). Or they
screw up the contract details without the assistance of
a professional, and end up costing themselves a huge
chunk of money.<br>
</blockquote>
</div>
Again, a red herring. We're not buying a house here.
<div><br>
<blockquote type="cite"> <br>
Now maybe it will make sense for a future convention for
us to again do it by ourselves. Maybe we'll have
developed sufficient expertise, and maybe we can find a
great deal at a great location, and maybe the
opportunity costs (e.g., staff and volunteer time) won't
overshadow the purported savings. But I haven't yet
seen any hard numbers which make that case.<br>
</blockquote>
</div>
Every national LP convention has been put on without
Helms-Briscoe's "expertise".<br>
<br>
Somehow, we've muddled through for 40 years. I have no
doubt we can do so for another 40 years.<br>
<br>
Regardless of how cost is, or is not, passed along to the
convention delegates in higher costs, the service provided
by Helms-Briscoe is NOT free.<br>
<br>
And that was the main point in my email note.<br>
<br>
I would further note that Vicki Kirkland is probably more
responsible for getting the final room night expense down to
$95 than Helms-Briscoe. Vicki had several meetings and
many phone calls with Linda, our contact at the Rosen Centre
to put the deal back on the table after the aborted LA
convention deal.<br>
<br>
I have yet to see any value add for Helms-Briscoe. Let's
fire them and move on.<br>
<br>
Yours in liberty.....................Mark Hinkle,
<div>
<div><br>
LNC At-Large & Retired LP Chair<br>
<blockquote type="cite"> <br>
Daniel Wiener<br>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Nov 27, 2012 at 9:30
PM, Mark Hinkle <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:mark@garlic.com" target="_blank">mark@garlic.com</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
<div>Dear LNC,<br>
<br>
I recommend we fire Helms Briscoe.<br>
<br>
Their services are anything but free. <br>
<br>
Here's a copy of an email note I sent to Kevin
Knedler while I was LP Chair referencing a
spreadsheet we received from Helms Briscoe
supposedly responding to our stated
specifications:<br>
<blockquote type="cite"><p class="MsoNormal"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size:12pt">On Fri, Dec 30,
2011 at 4:02 AM, Mark Hinkle <<a href="mailto:mark@garlic.com" target="_blank">mark@garlic.com</a>>
wrote:</span></font></p>
<font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size:12pt">Kevin,<br>
<br>
I see Robert Kraus has already
responded, but I must say, of the 29
properties listed in the spreadsheet she
sent, only 2 met our requirements of
$139 (or was it $129?) or less per night
for guess rooms.<br>
<br>
And since the Rosen Center directly
offered us a $99 room night (for
2014/2016?) versus $126 via Helms
Brisco, it sure looks like we're getting
screwed here.<br>
<br>
I thought the idea was to getting better
rates via Helms Brisco, not worse rates.<br>
<br>
I'd say let's give them one more shot.
But, if they don't perform this time,
I'll recommend terminating our contract
with them.<br>
<br>
FYI....................Mark Hinkle, LNC
Chair</span></font></blockquote>
<br>
Helms Briscoe gets a $126 per night room rate
versus the $99 rate that Vicki Kirkand and
Stewart Flood were offered directly from the
Rosen Center.<br>
<br>
That's a $27 premium to use Helms Briscoe.
That's NOT my definition of "free". Not by a
long shot.<br>
<br>
Helms Briscoe gets paid a commission by the
hotel.<br>
<br>
Where do you suppose the hotel gets the money
to pay for that commission?<br>
<br>
Bonus prize if you said: "you and me"!!!<br>
<br>
TANSTAAFL<br>
<br>
Helms Briscoe gets paid handsomely for their
efforts and every penny of those costs are
passed onto the consumer (you and me) in the
form of higher room night costs, higher food
and beverage costs, etc.<br>
<br>
FYI..................Mark Hinkle,<br>
LNC At-Large & Retired LP Chair<br>
<br>
P.S. We can do far better on our own with the
help of Robert Kraus, Admiral Colley, Ruth
Bennett and Nancy Neale.<br>
<br>
<pre cols="72">"It does not take a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men."
- Samuel Adams</pre></div></div></blockquote></div></blockquote></div></div></div></blockquote></div>
</blockquote>
</div></blockquote></div></div></div></div></div></div>
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