San Diego: No room at the inn or anywhere else
It’s official.
No more tickets for San Diego. That’s a full two months out. Last year, the last ticket sold out a week out, according to Robot 6. Even with this, we are hearing about people pulling out of SD due to money concerns, so we’ll see.
05/28/09 at 1:04 pm
If SDCC wanted to make more money, they would team up with a hotel and sell a combo package for more than the sum of the parts.
As per my suggestion last year, some cruise line company needs to dock in San Diego and sell rooms/cabins during the length of the SDCC. Or create a special comics themed cruise from LA to SD featuring close personal time with writers, artists, editors, etc. Maybe team-up with Marvel or DC to do it.
05/28/09 at 1:23 pm
Re: Cruise…Been done.
http://www.cbldf.org/pr/010221-cruisecancelled.shtml
05/28/09 at 1:49 pm
Ahh well, there’s always next year (he says for the fifth year running)
05/28/09 at 1:54 pm
I don’t think launching from the “Big Easy Con” is quite the same as launching from San Diego. A cruise might work when you have 10 gazillion attendees.
05/28/09 at 2:12 pm
Impressive! People must have heard that I wasn’t going to be there this year!
05/28/09 at 2:27 pm
The USS Midway is available… lots of room, and the money could go towards the museum. Or SDCC could team with a local college or university and rent dorm rooms.
SDCC could also pre-sell four (and a half) day passes, with purchasers having first go at the reservation system.
Regarding the cruise, why connect it to a land-based convention? Why not have it be the convention itself? The only restriction… 5500 passengers. Cruises are all-inclusive (Disney 3-Day cruise $1,136 – $2,430 for 1 adult). If a cruise doesn’t have a specific destination, it might be even cheaper to operate.
Or one could blaze the trail and rent a yacht or houseboat during the Convention (I see one yacht, at Harbor Island, with access to Sheraton Hotel amenities… $269 a night). (Or rent an apartment downtown.) (Or bring your own boat and dock at the Embarcadero Marina.)
05/28/09 at 2:33 pm
Tim: Doesn’t San Diego HAVE 10 gazillion attendees?
Torsten…those have all been tried, with success.
05/28/09 at 4:36 pm
“Even with this, we are hearing about people pulling out of SD due to money concerns, so we’ll see.”
Seems to me like SDCC should indeed set up a refund system and potentially a waiting list with tickets awarded partly by first-come-first-served and partly by random drawing or a weighted system so that people from smaller states (and from other countries) have a better chance of winning than those from more populous states such as California, Texas and Noo Yawk
I’ve been going to SDCC since 2000. I used to live in San Diego but moved to central MO five years ago. Most years, even when I still lived in SD, I still wouldn’t know until mid-June if I could even afford to go to the Con this year Even if tickets were available now, I probably can’t this year — first miss since I started going — solely due to hotel costs. But still, if I figure out how to make it work, it’d be heartening to be able to be on a waitlist.
— Rob
05/28/09 at 5:10 pm
I can’t imagine SDCC should want to do anything to change their system of selling out and having everybody’s money.
I have no idea what it means and it probably doesn’t mean anything, but the last two years hotel rooms started to come back through the service in June, but this year there’s been several options for almost every day since early May.
05/28/09 at 5:17 pm
I didn’t get my hotel room until this week, since I didn’t get my time off from work until now.
Happily learned that if I have a room on the north side of the building, I can watch the Padres games from my suite.
05/28/09 at 5:32 pm
ShutUpRob wrote: “Seems to me like SDCC should indeed set up a refund system and potentially a waiting list . . . ”
Don’t know about the waiting list, but they will refund your membership if you submit your request in writing by a certain date; I believe this year it’s June 19.
05/28/09 at 5:37 pm
I was thinking a 7 day cruise from LA-SD [2 days], SDCC long weekend [3 days, Fri-Sun or Thu-Sat], and SD-LA [2 days]. Partner with Marvel, DC, CBLDF, etc.
I don’t think that’s been specifically been done before.
05/28/09 at 7:31 pm
I’m unemployed (layoff) and I’m going. Comic-Con registration is inexpensive (hello, it’s non-profit!), so are the Amtrak rides from/to Orange County (hello, it’s subsidized!), I’ve got my Ralphs Club card, and one can have loads of fun at the convention itself without spending a penny. The only real expense for the non-out-of-state traveler is the hotel room; I’m glad we (myself and two family members) got one that’s “only” $300/night plus taxes.
BTW, how come no one complains about hotel taxes in these Comic-Con threads? Note also that California sales tax is 1% higher than last year.
05/28/09 at 7:35 pm
Last year I literally walked into the Hilton right down the street from the Con and booked 3 nights in a room at about 8pm on the Friday night of the Con– and for a reasonable, non-inflated price. But I was willing to totally risk it (I had a crap room a bit far off the reservation, crap meaning a dirty hole of a hotel room miles away, which I gave up gladly). One year I didn’t have a room at all, and just bummed around and stayed wherever I could, this was going back a bit, mind you) (back when that kind of thing would be considered fun to a young shaver). I guess someone would know this better than me, but it seems certain groups and/or people reserve big blocks of rooms and often don’t take them, leaving last minute holes in the reservation schedual. I suspect there’s some kind of racket to it all.
05/28/09 at 8:56 pm
Paul,
You’ve been an OFFICIAL GUEST at the Con before, correct?
If so, do your accomodations get taken care of for you or is that still left to the individual?
05/28/09 at 9:45 pm
Damn, I really picked the wrong year to be ~noble~ and not ask my pro friend for a pass, didn’t I?
05/29/09 at 2:49 am
Sold Out with 2 mos. to go?
This thing better’d be worth the $65 I paid for my 4-day+Preview Night pass, then!
05/29/09 at 4:09 am
They should rent out some of the empty apartment buildings that are for sale downtown!
I don’t know who thought they should built these towers of living right in the middle of the convention center and ballpark.
Can you imagine on any particular day walking out of your apartment building only to be besieged by the latest dentist convention crowd or the next mass of humanity ready for a ball game?
Not what I’d like to find in my front yard….
05/29/09 at 9:59 am
I agree with Tomko, that’s a great idea. Industrious SD’ers could make a pretty penny renting out to people who come for the big cons and need convenient short term lodging. I’ve seen legit online businesses which handle and screen both renters and guests in different cities in the US and Europe.
When you’re a guest, the con covers the basic travel and room at either the Marriott or Hilton, right by the con. It guarentees guys like me have no excuse for being late to signings, haha…the upshot is you’re busy as hell. The last time I was a guest it was non-stop work, I didn’t get a chance to wander the floor and look around, except to get lost at one point on the way to a panel discussion. Stressful, but maybe that’s just me.
05/29/09 at 10:32 am
Oh to be a guest of San Diego Con… that would be nice.
05/30/09 at 8:05 am
It’s wierd, but every year the hysteria gets more mental on SDCC. Last year the preview night was like the usual Friday, the Thursday was like the Saturday and the Saturday was, well, like a Saturday. They’re still full. You can’t go higher.
I did hear a rumour however that there’s a couple of thousand less tickets this year as they’ve widened walkways – if there’s anything to this then I thank SDCC for that, as the current narrow ones are a nightmare – and this might be why they sold out quicker.
As for hotel rooms, many people use multiple people / computers on the day of SDCC hotel booking madness and so end up with multiple rooms, rooms that they then cancel right before the ‘we’re taking a nights deposit’ stage. So June does open up some last minute treats.
Not me, though – I have my room already sorted – booked it back in January…