Host Housing Requirement

[ferlisi]

Was wondering if any parents have been required to use host housing when traveling to a tournament. If so what are your thoughts? Having some challenges accepting this as a "mandate". Clearly something that is useful if/when teams need it. The fact that it is "required" is where I'm having some challenges. By the way this is for 11/12 year old girls. Appreciate the feedback.

 

[andyh64000]

Was wondering if any parents have been required to use host housing when traveling to a tournament. If so what are your thoughts? Having some challenges accepting this as a "mandate". Clearly something that is useful if/when teams need it. The fact that it is "required" is where I'm having some challenges. By the way this is for 11/12 year old girls. Appreciate the feedback.

Do you mean they require you all to stay at the same hotel?

 

[Hollyrockartist]

If the case is as andy asked, I can see where that is a good thing. When we travelled with the high school, the girls all stayed on the same floor in the same hotel. The Coach took cell phones at 10pm and it was lights out by 11pm - no questions asked. If parents went and wanted daughters to stay with them, that was fine, but the rule still stood about lights out. Gratefully, mine chose to stay in the room with some teammates!

 

[Amy in AZ.]

A host hotel is the hotel that the tournament requires the teams to stay at. If i recall, you have to stay there.

People object when they have family that they could stay with or they want to use camp grounds.

 

[SoftSocDad]

Event organizers will tell you that it helps with communication, etc. when everyone stays in the same place, but what they won't tell you is that they get a kickback on each room sold in the form of free rooms for their staff, cash, or other considerations.

I've never been a fan and as a (former) sporting event organizer myself, I never required it.

 

[Coach-n-Dad]

We had to choose a host sponsorod hotel at Sparkler. The hotel was fabulous and no more expensive than a non-host hotel. We were told that if our team didn't stay in a host hotel we would be fined $500. A family can stay with relatives with no problem as long as a majority of the team stays in the host hotel.

Kickbacks to the organizers? I'm sure there are.
Better communications? No
Team staying in the same hotel? Awesome

 

[softballphreak]

My understanding is teams are required to book the rooms through a particular agency. The agency marks the rooms up near 30%. They kickback some of the money to the tournament organizers.

If one were to call the hotel and not let the hotel know you were part of a team playing in the tournament you would get a different (lower) rate.

Normally the tournament director has committed to a binding contract with the booking agency to require teams to book through the agency. If not, the team has to pay a fee (usually $500 per team) or be kicked out of the tournament.

Some see this as a good thing--not having to book their own rooms. If you consider the extra cost per room per night it seems pretty expensive to me considering the number of rooms a team needs.

Booking rooms used to be what the proud team mom did; for as little as an Outback gift card at the end of the season.

If there's a dollar to be taken someone will find a way to do it.

 

[InsidePitch]

My guess is this arrangement is known in advance. If enough people objected to it and just avoided those tournaments, eventually the lack of attendance would force the to change or perish. Let them know why you won't be attending next year OR you could force the issue by getting some deep pockets dad to have his attorney serve the tournament director naming him specifically for shaking down the teams. Funny how getting served, naming you individually, rips the mask of club or association anonymity right off. People start thinking what just answering a summons with their own attorney is going to cost and quickly dispense with any fines and quickly change their tune.