BUFFALO, N.Y. — The future of Buffalo's largest hotel, which is still trying to rebuild after a devastating fire, is vital to its visitor industry according to Patrick Kaler, the president and CEO of Visit Buffalo Niagara.
Kaler says as long as uncertainty lingers regarding the former Buffalo Grand Hotel, so too will the impact of that uncertainty remain on his group's efforts to attract meetings and conventions to Buffalo.
A vital cog for a comeback
While the level of convention business still lags behind its pre-pandemic levels, Kaler sees signs of its eventual return.
"It's coming back because people desire to meet face to face," Kaler told WGRZ-TV.
According to Kaler, among the things conventioneers seek most when traveling is hotel accommodations close to where they are meeting.
In the last decade, hundreds of new hotel rooms have been built in downtown Buffalo, to the point where there are just over 2,000 within a 10-minute walk of the Buffalo Niagara Convention Center.
However, according to Kaler, "our current hotel inventory is holding us back on future bookings."
A grand place
When it was operational the former Buffalo Grand Hotel, with nearly 500 rooms, was the city's largest hotel and accounted for more than 20% of rooms downtown.
However, it has been closed for 15 months since an arson fire on New Year's Eve 2021.
"That's a big gap for us," Kaler said.
Constructed as the Buffalo Hilton in the late 1970s, and opened at the same time as the city's convention center, the hotel carried the distinction of being among the most important developments for a city attempting to revitalize itself.
Through a series of ownership and branding changes, it remained essential to the city's convention business.
According to Kaler, it was attractive not only because of its medium price point, but also because of its sheer size.
"Those who book conventions like to sign as few contracts as possible," he said, explaining that a small to medium-sized convention could house all of its guests and hold all of its meetings at the Buffalo Grand.
However, in the absence of the Buffalo Grand, attendees to a similar-sized convention might currently have to spread out to several hotels.
A grand plan
"We never imagined it would take this long," said hotel owner Harry Stinson, regarding his efforts to reopen the hotel during an interview with WGRZ's Michael Wooten.
Stinson says despite not yet receiving an insurance settlement, and a lingering investigation into the fire, he plans to have several hundred rooms here available by sometime this summer.
"We just can't wait any longer. It's going to to be a heavy lift but we'll get it done," he said.
Convention bureau banking on hotel reopening
The reopening of the hotel would be welcome news to Kaler and his agency, as would a firm date on the hotel being planned by developer Douglas Jemal inside the former Statler Hilton, which continues to undergo a several years long renovation across the street from the convention center.
"We can't sell people on, 'Well, it's coming,' " Kaler said. "That's part of our problem right now. We're booking things for 2025, 2026, 2027 and even into 2028 and the uncertainty of what's happening at the Buffalo Grand and the Statler and when they might re-open challenges us with our hotel propositions for meeting planners."
Almost as important as its re-opening, Kaler says it's critical that Stinson has the hotel branded by a major chain, because so many who travel for meetings and conventions are enrolled in rewards programs and want those points.
Stinson assured that a deal to flag the hotel as Ramada by Wyndham, inked just hours before the fire broke out, remains in place and has not wavered.