Right now we have two big choices for hotels!


First, the Holiday Inn Worthington http://whihotels.com/ebrochures/hicolumbus/index.html
This hotel just makes you happy to be in! It has EXACTLY enough space (as in, it will be tight), but the atmosphere is really great and I like it a lot.

The second is the Marriott North http://marriott.com/property/propertypage/CMHNO
This hotel has a little more space (although I think the panel rooms will be a bit smaller), so we can have a bigger dealers room, and more fun. Also it is about 10 minutes down the road from the Clarion, which has told us they will probably be able to give us 50 dollar rooms for congoers! I think that would probably bring in a lot of people, of course if we don't sell enough marriott rooms we're in trouble!
The other downside of this hotel is that there is no central area, and I want there to be a place for people to hang out and have fun.

So what do you guys think? I'll post more once I start getting contracts for these places!

One thing to make sure of is readily available food sources.

The Marriott is about a 20 minute walk/ 4 minute drive from a subway, wendies, skyline, and a chinese restaurant I think we can deal with (get discounts for attendees).

The Holiday inn is near a chipotlay, a BWIII, a family restaunt, some other chain restaurant, and a japanese place that again I think will deal with us.

Both are near theaters, but I think I would be far more able to deal with the Marriotts theater than the holiday inns.
Do you think anyone would leave the con hotel to walk down to a theater for a showing? Especially if they would have to pay (not full price, probably, maybe like 5 bucks a head?)

I think it would be cool to show something like MindGame or Perfect Blue or something in a real theater, something you normally wouldn't get the chance to. Maybe even something that did get a showing, but not recently, like Akira or Princess Mononoke. I would love to do this, but at the same time, I could kind of see no one showing up, and having one very pissed theater to deal with.

Opinions?

As much as I'd love to see anime on a big screen it I don't thinka lot of people would go see something they've probably already seen. The risk is too big to have someone pissed of at AP this early. If something gets messed up then the convention might have a hard time holding any events of the sort later on because of a bad rep. On the other hand though It would be absolutely amazing to see something like Akira that big. Would admission just be with the con or would you have to pay extra (like 3 bucks)?

Marriott has my vote It's bigger and we can make our own central area if need be. As cool as the big screen idea is that just dosn't seem doable to me. People walk into a con to not walk out inless dragged out.

WE HAVE THE HOLIDAY INN!!!!
(sorry panda)

We negotiated for literally hours between the two hotels, and at one point we honest-to-God gave the phone with one hotel to the rep of the other hotel and let them argue with each other over us! You know you're good when they argue on your own behalf!

Well, long story short, even after the Marriott guy telephoned us at the least minute and dramatically raised his final offer from 20,000 bonus points to "ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND BONUS POINTS, AND YOU AND YOUR FRIENDS WILL BE PLATINUM MEMBERS FOR LIFE!!!" we stuck with the Holiday Inn.
Why? Why would we give up platinum and bonus points?
Because Holiday would let themselves be talked down to 79 dollar nights, and Marriott only went down to 89. That's right, we gave up free flights and cheap hotels for life for you guys! And you say we never do nothin' for you!

Also, we decided to drop the reg charge from 40 at the door to 35. Pre-reg will still be 25 for a while, and then probably 30 at some point... I don't know when.



As for the movie... we would let the theater charge you, but probably not the full price. I'm thinkin like 5 bucks. Isn't Akira worth a fiver?

What about parties? Are they going to care about room parties or are they just giving of a con block? Also gratz on getting a hotel. I'm really excited as to how this is going to turn out. As for Akira..as awesome as that movie is (on par with The Thing) I don't think anyone will drop a fiver that can be spent on something tangible let alone spend money on seeing anime on a big movie screen when they can goto a movie viewing room and see an anime on a reasonably large screen.

BUT! What would be a good idea is to use that as maybe a promotional event a few weeks or months before Anime Punch 06. It'd get the word out among the locals if anime clubs spread the word to each other.

hmm... perhaps.

Room parties, they basically said if it's in a sleeping room, they don't care what happens.

At the same time, we arn't the only ones in the hotel. They said they would try to section us off fairly well, so it shouldn't be too big a problem. We aught to be able to party to our hearts delight!

Note: The other group is Junior High Cheerleaders. This could get interesting!

Oh my god. I love you.

hell yea let the advertising begin!

We've decided that we will advertise the dance in the hotel, then charge non-AP people to get in!
Also, to make things nicer for the fan boys, I think the adds will read like this:

Rave, X-oclock saturday night in the main ballroom, every welcome!
Cost:
AP member with badge - 0
People in Costume, outfit, or uniform - $5
All other people - $10

Hopefully we'll make some money, and hopefully the "other people" will find a way to get the lower rate heh heh heh!

Let me say, the final hotel choice was...choice. :blink: I will actually be able to come now that a hotel has magamimically appeared.

Psst. Maybe you should announce the con rate on the website ~.^

Good call!

We'll be putting up pre-reg info wednesday night probably. I've had the rates added for now though!

Thanks for the heads up!