July 23, 2008
The Great Olympic Meltdown: Beijing hotels slash rates after foreign tourists fail to show up
Unusual honesty from the Shanghai Daily which makes you wonder if they're not actually gloating:
HOTELS in Beijing are slashing prices for next month's Olympics after the expected windfall of visitors failed to materialize, hotels and travel industry executives said yesterday.The last we heard, youth hostels have also jacked up their rates to RMB400 per bed per night, so our friends in Shanghai have shelved off their Olympic plans. Good luck to the youth hostels.Fan Runjun, of travel Website Ctrip.com, said many two to four-star hotels had reduced prices by 10 to 20 percent compared to May and June and some had slashed rates by as much as 30 percent.
The usual pre-Olympic festive atmosphere host cities experience has not yet hit Beijing. In June, the number of visitors to the capital declined by 19.9 percent from a year earlier, according to the Beijing Tourism Authority.
Average room prices in three-star hotels are now down to 400 yuan (US$60) a night from 700 yuan in previous months. Four-star hotels have dropped prices to about 800 yuan a night from 1,500 yuan.
Shanghaiist also can't help but snigger at all the greedy Beijing landlords that were forcing their tenants out in the hopes of renting their apartments out to foreigners at ridiculous daily rates, only to find the world now crashing on them. If any of you needs a part-time job managing short term renters, get in touch with Dan Brody — now.
And for those of you that are still fretting over where to stay in Beijing, check out this apartment which is available anytime now at US$100 a day — what a bargain!
Photo from Kriz Dux
| 
add to stumble upon
add to reddit
email this
add to facebook
add to del.icio.us
[ report this ]
--"Beijing landlords...only to find the world now crashing on them."
I think the right wording should be "world has to crash on them", without a visa.
[ report this ]
Many people outside China couldn't gives a rats arse about these Games.
[ report this ]
"Many people outside China couldn't gives a rats arse about these Games."
I don't think this is relevant, as many people do care. The amusing thing is just seeing people who were looking to profit off of the situation squirm, and I am not referring to the hotels. The landlords who forced out otherwise good tenants deserve it.
RMB400 for a hostel in China is absurd though. 1) Chinese have cheaper places to stay; 2) Average hostel types will be put off the prices; 3) Those who spent so much money to come to the city from abroad will probably just spend a little extra to get the comfort of a hotel room.
[ report this ]
I guess hotels will be full after the news that Beijing will set up specially designated zones, three public parks, for protesters during next month's Olympics.
i know your sandal wearing faked liberals and "reporter-without-father" are only interested in China bashing new sport and in serving as foot-soldiers on the bandwagon of neo-con's geopolitical agenda. So Good luck, but no sleep on streets, naked or stink or not, as you guys always do, with or without a visa. lol!
[ report this ]
@eastman
I'll ask again: how old are you?
[ report this ]
there was a great article in the WSJ last week about the problem of offering VIP treatment when there are so many VIPS. Problems with all the private jets coming in etc. It's telling how all the high end stuff has long been booked out,but all the mid range stuff is still empty.
This gap between those going 'for show' and those that are there actual fans/tourist to me signifies how much guanxi you need to run shit in china, it's all top down and from the inside. Actually attending the opening ceremonies and world-sponsor-reception-dinner makes ivy league admissions look like pushovers. The opening ceremonies is simply a shallow nightclub for the world's elite.
Thank god I scored an opening ceremony ticket and reception dinner invite, it's going to be the most ball'er shit ever.
/I'll show myself out
[ report this ]
Why to "these people" Need to stay in a youth hostel so badly such that if they can't stay in a hostel, they'll no longer visit Beijing? Why not just get a 2 or 3 star hotel then? What a freakin' joke! Is this a ridiculous attempt to keep true to the backpackers' mentality?
[ report this ]
Ride on! I moved away from Beijing, after my landlord offered me 4-times the normal rent for June and July, and 15-times the normal rent for August and September.
I will be back in Beijing in October and squeeze the rent to rock-bottom. That will be a feast!
[ report this ]
It's true and a bit sad that the China's Olympic PR blitz doesn't seem to have been as effective as they'd hoped. It's difficult for people outside China to understand that it is impossible to have the kind of development that raises half a billion people out of abject poverty without some pretty awful side affects i.e. displacing millions without compensation for the 3 Gorges Dam, torturing Tibetan nuns, over 1 million evictions for Olympic construction, and the countless other abuses that occurred before the government's recent serious drive to reduce corruption.
I think we've seen a decline in the rate of these abuses though, but it'll be up to progressive Chinese, such as journalists Li Datong and Zhang Ping to encourage people to think critically and reject their government's paternal, condescending attitude.
All that aside, it's still hard to attract people from free, clean countries to the most polluted country on earth, where you could be arrested just for wearing a t-shirt with some political slogan on it. You don't have to be a "neo con" to make that connection... Still, if you actually care about triple jump and rowing, you gotta hope the Olypics rock!
[ report this ]
To Stephan_Larose
--"displacing millions without compensation for the 3 Gorges Dam... over 1 million evictions for Olympic construction"?
I guess you not only ate what you were fed but also the spoon as well.
[ report this ]
Next to football triple jump is my favorite sport!