Posted on 12/24/2008 11:14:16 AM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Reader Ross Zelman writes:
If you want to get a picture of how bad the US & world economy are doing, ask your readers to describe their holiday travel abroad. I’m in Aruba right now (having a great family vacation). This is our seventh trip in eight years; we’ve been timeshare owners for half that time. We aren’t experts in any sense, but simple observation and inquiry shows that hotels are at less than 50%, hotel staff are reduced, planes are flying less frequently and at less than full occupancy, restaurant reservations are easy to come by and fellow travellers are looking at the empty lounge chairs next to them and all agreeing that things are even worst than in 2001. If optional travel is a leading indicator, the economy is going to retract faster than we even realized.
Just thought that with your blog, you could get a quick taste of locations that Americans are traveling to around the world. Or not.
Got anything to report out there? There were plenty of cars on the road today, and as I mentioned earlier, New York didn’t seem slow. On the other hand, we got extremely good deals on our hotel stays, and New Yorkers told me that things were, in fact, slower than last year.
UPDATE: Reader Matt Johnson emails: “Over Thanksgiving we stayed at a resort in Aspen that is normally $550/night. Our price on Priceline was $160. I asked the front desk and they said normally thanksgiving is booked six months in advance and Christmas over a year in advance (Christmas still had plenty of capacity at that time).”
ANOTHER UPDATE: Reader John Kingston emails: “Last week, I had breakfast at the Marriott in Philadelphia on Market Street. This is the chain’s main hotel in the city, and it sits right in the center of it all. On other visits, the lobby was always a beehive of activity. I sat down to breakfast with my guest, and we talked for about 10 minutes before the waiter came along. He asked us if we wanted to order. I said we’d just have the buffet. He said there was no buffet, and I commented that I’d never been to a hotel like that without a buffet. The reason? Occupancy the night before was 9%. Nine!! (This according to our waiter). And this was still in the middle of a relatively normal business week, not the week of Christmas itself.”
MORE: From Northridge, New Jersey, Fred Rabinowitz writes: “Went shopping at Garden State Plaza (Paramus, NJ) with my daughter the other night. The mall itself was very busy. Macy’s was filled with customers. Nordstrom’s had few.”
Reader Jason Mart emails: “My family is in Telluride for a long planned ski reunion trip. Telluride has the best snow in decades (7+ feet in December) and the town is at about 40 -50% of normal for Christmas week. Lift lines are never more than 30 seconds, restaurants that normally would require a week in advance reservation are available for walk ins with immediate seating, real estate deals abound, in short, many area business owners will simply not make it. This is their high season and it is a total bust.”
Reader Jeff Benkel writes:
I’m spending this week in a timeshare next to the Heavenly ski resort in Lake Tahoe. Before this year, trading for Christmas week in Tahoe would be absolutely unthinkable. The complex appears to be less than half full. Of the three poker rooms I’ve visited (my kids love to ski but I hate snow), two had only one game going, the other had three tables for a tournament they usually have to limit to 8.
Separately, as an alumni of THE Ohio State University living in Phoenix, I was worried about being able to secure a ticket to this year’s Fiesta Bowl to see the Buckeyes play Texas in my backyard. My family owns a restaurant where we have an OSU banner hanging. Seeing the banner, we’ve been offered tickets at least 5 times already, but it was no problem getting seats straight from the OSU box office. My friends in Columbus tell me that they’re hearing reports that Texas has sold only 1,000 of their 17,000 ticket allotment.
Ouch. Bad news, if true. Reader Dale Russelll writes:
I attended a urology meeting in Scottsdale recently. The organizers also put on a winter urology conference in Vail each year. The director of the conference in Scottsdale was encouraging attendees to also go to the winter conference as well, pointing out that the hotel that last year had cost $550 a night was offering a block of rooms at only $250 a night this year. The rack rate for that hotel is shown as $450 to $1790. (Still think it is expensive, even at $250)
And James Yeomans emails: “Every year my wife and I take the kids out of school for two weeks and go to the Caribbean right around Christmas. We both have long-term employment and actually had a good year earnings-wise (certainly not 401k-wise), but we are waiting until the end of the first quarter ‘09 to make any vacation plans. This ‘wait and see’ approach has got its merits, for sure; I wonder how many others are in the same boat as us?”
Yes, travel seems to be hardest-hit — restaurants, etc. still seem to be doing fine as best I can tell from my unscientific survey. Makes sense: Travel’s easiest to cut back on, and they’ve made it more miserable every year anyway. At least, unless you’re Michael Bolton!
What does all this anecdotal reportage mean? Hard to say — there’s a slowdown, but how much of it is psychology and how much of it is fundamental? And how much is people holding out for better deals? I guess we’ll see.
I think the guy with the wait and see attitude is a reflection of what’s happening with a lot of Americans. Financially, we’re in good shape, but you just don’t know what’s going to happen w/taxes or what Obama’s going to do, so it’s safer to not spend the money you’d normally spend, even though you have it to spend.
If I want to know how the economy is doing, I don't think quizzing those Americans who are sunning themselves on the beaches of Aruba or swooshing down the slopes of Aspen would be my first thought.
You know, shouldn’t the foreigners be happy that there are fewer “ugly Americans” abroad? This is a “good” thing, isn’t it?/sarc
the only family member I’m concern with is a teacher in Texas, and since TEXAS is ok financially it seems (one of the lucky 7 states) she’s on her own as far as I’m concerned now.
I wish I could convince her to learn Spanish, think that would make her indispensable as a teacher.
but then again, she’s a democrat (I did shame her into voting for McCain for the good that did.
The rest of us in Iowa are sorting through what we can do to take advantage of this situation. And planting vegetable gardens in the spring.
My wife and I took our vavation to Paris. Prices not bad and on the way there Airbus 330 had about 50 people on it. On the way back not one open seat.
grocery store was packed when my youngest son and i went to get eggs for our Christmas cassarol a few hours ago.
I took the family to Disney World last week. The place was packed...the hotel we stayed at, Wilderness Lodge, was at 100% capacity. I heard all of the resorts at Disney were at similar levels of capacity.
That’s right. Wal-Mart and Kroger are packed with families shopping. That’s where most Americans are.
The elite are sipping wine in Tuscany.
Bet I know which group is the happiest (and it’s not the elites).
Doesn’t really matter “why.” There is a slow-down, and it will get worse.
This article is about people who have money, but who are still unwilling to spend it in such uncertain times and regardless that the prices of things have dropped sharply.
IOW, there may be a problem with fundamentals, but there’s a bigger problem with confidence. Plus, it’s the “haves” who, unless filthy rich, had because they worked hard and saved well-—these are the ones hardest hit by the debacle in the stock market and in home values. For them, the first instinct is to cut all or most discretionary spending.
It’s not good for the economy,especially one as consumer-driven as ours, but that’s how financially wise people respond to hard times.
I see less economic activity everywhere. We cancelled a trip to Hawaii and the hotel begged us not to. In fact, they waived the cancellation fee and insisted on rescheduling the reservation for January “just in case”-—with them waiving any cancellation fees in the future, etc., if we didn’t show up.
What was that about? All we could figure was that having that they were hoping that reservation out there possibly did entice some people to eventually make their trip.
Honolulu hotels had a vacancy rate approaching 60% this fall. Some restaurants have closed already.
Maybe it’s because Disney is offering 3 free nights at its hotels?
That offer is all over my town.
This is the key: people with money still don’t want to spend it.
They got into good shape financially by spending and saving wisely. They are going to be the first to cut back and take a wait and see attitude.
I know one family that easily cut out $3,000 a month in spending since September-—all discretionary. Multiply that by many households and the economy will feel it.
But it’s a shock to lose 40% of the value of one’s retirement savings in a week, and to discover that, yes, it’s true that your home is worth a couple of hundred thousand less than you paid for it a few years ago.
No stimulus check is going to counter that. So even those with money will rein it in. And they already have plenty of stuff, so it’s immaterial to them that stuff may get cheaper. They are not going to spend the big bucks again for a while.
I was there before that offer. Everyone had to spend full price for my week. I was in the Presidential suite at the Wilderness Lodge so no deals were offered to me.
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