Convention Authority, hotels poised for March Madness in tourism

The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority and the city’s resorts are gearing for their own version of March Madness this week.

March historically has been the busiest month of the year for Southern Nevada tourist visits, not only because of the focus on popular sporting events but because the convention calendar is packed.

Cathy Tull, senior vice president of marketing for the authority, told members of the board of directors at a recent meeting that March is shaping up to be a big month for the city based on advanced bookings and recent history.

Just look at what happened in March last year.

Based on occupancy rates, the three busiest weekends of 2014 were in March.

The weekend of March 7-8, when the Las Vegas Motor Speedway hosted the Kobalt 400 NASCAR race and The Orleans had the West Coast Conference basketball tournament, 98.6 percent of the city’s 150,000 rooms were filled.

The second-busiest weekend, March 22-23, included the opening round of the NCAA “Big Dance,” when 64 teams play in 48 games over four days.

It doesn’t matter that none of the games were in Las Vegas. People still crowded resorts to the tune of 98.2 percent occupancy so they could legally wager on game outcomes and sit among fans of teams from all over the country as the games are projected on dozens of big-screen televisions simultaneously in resort race and sports books.

The third-best weekend of 2014: March 14-15, when the Western Athletic, Pacific-12 and Mountain West conference basketball tournaments were played at the Orleans, the MGM Grand Garden Arena and the Thomas & Mack Center, respectively. The occupancy rate for that weekend was 97.9 percent.

The city just wrapped up that corresponding weekend Sunday. And Thursday marks the start of first-round action in the NCAA tournament, the one for which frenzied fans will fill out millions of brackets in the nearly impossible quest to predict the winners of 63 games — 67 if you count four “play-in” games scheduled Tuesday and Wednesday.

The authority won’t have occupancy rate statistics for March this year until late April.

But for the Convention and Visitors Authority, it isn’t just about weekend visitors for basketball tournaments. There’s a full slate of conventions and trade shows coming to town in March, none of them massive megaevents, but collectively producing more than $166 million in nongaming economic impact.

Six shows with attendance of more than 10,000 people are on the March calendar, including ASD Market Week, a retail sales event that drew 46,000 people the first week of the month and the Wedding and Portrait Photographers Conference Expo that wrapped up March 5 at the MGM Grand for 11,000 delegates.

The Ace Hardware corporate meeting and trade show opens Wednesday for 14,000 delegates and runs through Friday at the Las Vegas Convention Center.

Later in the month, the tasty International Pizza Expo is at the Convention Center for 12,000 people March 23-26, GlobalShop, a retail trends and marketing trade show, is at Mandalay Bay for 10,000 people March 24-26 and a meeting of the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons that will draw 33,500 people is at the Sands Expo and Convention Center March 24-28.

Tucked within the sporting events was authority-sponsored Big League Weekend, a two-day series of spring training baseball games geared more for local fans’ enjoyment than as a tourist draw.

But the games between the Chicago Cubs and the Oakland A’s Friday and Saturday had a marketing component since broadcasts to Chicago and the San Francisco Bay area prominently mentioned Las Vegas.

The authority’s March Madness figures to be a prelude to more big events later in the spring.

Many schools are observing spring break March 28 through April 5, the week before Easter. While Las Vegas isn’t a huge spring break destination, there’s usually a bump in traffic when students take a break from classes.

And right after that, one of the top five conventions by attendance lands in Las Vegas.

The National Association of Broadcasters, which expects to draw 98,000 people, lands at the Las Vegas Convention Center April 13-16.

Uncharted visitation waters lie ahead in early May when Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather enter the boxing ring in one of the most anticipated fights in the city’s history.

The Convention and Visitors Authority usually calculates nongaming economic impact based on the number of arena seats sold for boxing matches.

This fight could be different because of the high interest in both boxers. Several resorts are planning events within their properties for viewing parties from the telecast of the fight from the MGM Grand Garden Arena.

Mayweather’s last three fights in Las Vegas have been sell-outs with the economic impact estimated at between $10.9 million and $11.4 million.

Pacquiao’s last three fights have produced an estimated economic impact of between $10 million and $11.1 million.

One week after the Pacquiao-Mayweather fight, a new event debuts in Las Vegas — the Rock in Rio music festival May 8-9 and May 15-16. The festival grounds, being built at Las Vegas Boulevard and Sahara Avenue, will have a capacity of 80,000 people a day and festival officials say they are on track to sell an average 50,000 tickets a day.

Contact reporter Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Find on Twitter: @RickVelotta