Portland’s Benson Lodge will shut quickly, as occupancy plummets

Just one of Portland’s most storied motels is closing its doorways for the winter season.

The Benson Hotel in downtown Portland introduced Tuesday that it will shut down via the rest of December and all of January, due to a significant drop in reservations prompted by the coronavirus pandemic.

George Schweitzer, running director of the Benson, said occupancy degrees have dropped down below 10% in December, immediately after hovering below 20% for a great deal of the year.

“It can make much more feeling to shut than to try out to stay open below occupancy at that stage,” Schweitzer mentioned. “You’re losing either way, but you are dropping much less money if you near than if you stay open up.”

The Benson will be closed as of Wednesday, Dec. 16, and aims to reopen Feb. 1. The resort will open for three nights around New Year’s Eve, on Dec. 30 and 31, as perfectly as Jan. 1. Reservations are even now open for these evenings, Schweitzer explained.

Most of the hotel’s staff, which experienced previously fallen from 165 to less than 30, will be laid off throughout the closure and rehired when the lodge reopens, Schweitzer explained. The resort plans on using the services of again the complete staff if business turns all around in 2021.

The wintertime closure caps off a challenging yr for the community hospitality sector. Just after the pandemic reduce off the move of travellers, downtown Portland was quickly thrust into an intercontinental highlight as racial justice protests flooded the city, usually eliciting a violent response from neighborhood and federal law enforcement.

In a countrywide survey performed this fall by buyer investigate business Engine Insights, only 32% of respondents reported they now thought of Portland an appealing family vacation desired destination. That compares to 54% who claimed the metropolis was desirable in a study carried out at the starting of 2020.

The pandemic had now closed a number of downtown Portland motels by the time the protests commenced, some of which bit by bit began to reopen around the summer time. The Benson, even so, has stayed open up as a result of all of it. This winter season closure will be the first time in its 107-calendar year record that it is shut its doorways, in accordance to the hotel.

“It’s been horrific economically, beyond my wildest imaginations,” Schweitzer said of the events of 2020. “Our business has not observed but the comprehensive influence.”

By the pandemic, the Benson has attempted to adapt to the altering requires of its friends. Lodge personnel have been cleaning rooms with clinic quality disinfectant, applying electrostatic sprayers right after just about every continue to be. Just one of the hotel’s signature events, an yearly gingerbread “masterpiece” unveiled for the duration of the vacation year, went digital this yr.

And as resort attendees have experienced fewer areas to go to all-around the city, the Benson has been advertising and marketing its own “mini museum,” which reveals off the record of the hotel with pics and artifacts, constructed into a 12-flooring marble staircase.

But with COVID-19 circumstances on the increase in Oregon, and Gov. Kate Brown’s “freeze” on general public gatherings and places to eat anticipated to prolong into winter, the lodge produced the difficult final decision to shutter its doorways via the worst of it.

“This hotel has under no circumstances shut,” Schweitzer reported. “I’m not happy about it, but it is the ideal final decision.”

–Jamie Hale jhale@oregonian.com 503-294-4077 @HaleJamesB