Virtue is its own reward,, but the money isn't bad either!
I booked too late to get into the Campanile in Glasgow for Concussion. This lapse of judgement ended up costing me £105 for me and exalted_mugwump between us.
The last day or two, I've been desperately collecting data on hotel bookings for previous Eastercons in order to try and predict whether we can sell enough hotel rooms to get free function space at the more expensive of the two hotels we're still considering.
As part of that search, I contacted the Campanile and found that although they'd sold 33 rooms for Concussion, this was less than the original allocation (which had reduced over time) and that they still had a room they were willing to give me at the convention rate.
It seems a bit hard on the City, who had also helpfully given me room booking numbers, but I'm afraid I cancelled my booking with them five minutes ago and am now staying in the Campanile.
Now if only I could get all fans resident in London to say, hand on heart, 'I promise to stay in the con hotel in 2008 rather than commute from London in order to save money' (and we promised that the room rate will be within a few quid of that at the Crowne Plaza in Glasgow) then I could breathe easy and say 'we'll do you an Eastercon in easy reach of London'. As it is, the numbers scare me. If we equal Glasgow's room bookings, then we're okay, but only with a very small safety margin. If too many people commuted, then the committee could be up the proverbial creek without a paddle.
There's a reason why conventions keep going back to places like the Adelphi and the Hinckley Island. They involve a lot less financial risk. (I've known con coms that lost £3000 or so and had to cover it out of their own pockets. It's not a pretty sight.)
We could use the same hotel with slightly less function space and be pretty certain on getting the costs to work, but the price of that would be a really small dealers room and almost certainly a social area (admittedly a very nice social area) without wheelchair access.
It's a very difficult decision.
The last day or two, I've been desperately collecting data on hotel bookings for previous Eastercons in order to try and predict whether we can sell enough hotel rooms to get free function space at the more expensive of the two hotels we're still considering.
As part of that search, I contacted the Campanile and found that although they'd sold 33 rooms for Concussion, this was less than the original allocation (which had reduced over time) and that they still had a room they were willing to give me at the convention rate.
It seems a bit hard on the City, who had also helpfully given me room booking numbers, but I'm afraid I cancelled my booking with them five minutes ago and am now staying in the Campanile.
Now if only I could get all fans resident in London to say, hand on heart, 'I promise to stay in the con hotel in 2008 rather than commute from London in order to save money' (and we promised that the room rate will be within a few quid of that at the Crowne Plaza in Glasgow) then I could breathe easy and say 'we'll do you an Eastercon in easy reach of London'. As it is, the numbers scare me. If we equal Glasgow's room bookings, then we're okay, but only with a very small safety margin. If too many people commuted, then the committee could be up the proverbial creek without a paddle.
There's a reason why conventions keep going back to places like the Adelphi and the Hinckley Island. They involve a lot less financial risk. (I've known con coms that lost £3000 or so and had to cover it out of their own pockets. It's not a pretty sight.)
We could use the same hotel with slightly less function space and be pretty certain on getting the costs to work, but the price of that would be a really small dealers room and almost certainly a social area (admittedly a very nice social area) without wheelchair access.
It's a very difficult decision.